Normally, my Sundays consist of catching up on the lack of sleep from the previous week, doing odds and ends around my house and relaxing. However, at the crack of dawn (so to speak), the Foodies found our way to Via’s Brunch around 10:30 am. By this time during the day, the weather was beautiful, with a slight breeze and warming up comfortably. While we sat on the patio and enjoyed each other’s company, there came the ever important item of choosing what we would consume on this lovely morning.
To start, a nice hot cup of coffee and some home-made zeppole ($8) did the trick. These small, deep fried donut holes were made to order and tossed in cinnamon sugar. They were very light and airy and made for a sweet start to the day. Secondly, looking for another traditional item, I shared the smoked salmon plate ($9). The presentation of this dish was excellent as well, coming as a build your own smoked salmon bite with whatever your heart (and taste buds) desired. The dish came on a cutting board with a hearty portion of smoked salmon, Tuscan bread, raw red onion, capers and mustard sauce. Every bite was the perfect combination of texture (the crunch from the bread and the raw onion), the mellowing of the smoked salmon, the saltiness of the capers and the tang of the mustard. All of this adds up to essentially, the perfect bite.
As if I hadn’t eaten enough for the morning, I decided that I needed an entrée. After perusing the menu, I decided on a breakfast staple…a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich ($10). The menu described this meal as an Italian style breakfast sandwich with eggs, bacon and parmesan cheese on a baguette, served with truffled frites. The eggs were mixed nicely with cheese, sautéed onions, red peppers. The bread held up nicely to the sandwich, but I found it was slightly tough to chew through as I navigated my way from one end of the sandwich to the other. I would have liked something that was a little bit softer. The truffled frites might be the best part of the entire dish. They were salty, potato strings tossed lightly in parmesan cheese. I could have sat down with an entire bowl of these frites and eaten all of them…worth the price of admission alone.
At the end of the day, and we had a chance to reflect and digest what we had eaten, it was decided that Via Brunch is a wonderful way to get out and enjoy this nice summer weather and enjoy some of the better food that the City of Worcester has to offer. Brunch was a deviation from the norm for the Foodies and I would welcome additional breakfast venues or brunch restaurants in the future. I am a sucker for any and all things breakfast and this was a wonderful combination of some of my favorite breakfast comfort foods.