This blog post was updated on October 16, 2018.
Home of the Full English Breakfast (also known as the all day breakfast), London is a great place to enjoy the most important meal of the day … as long as you know where to go. Indeed, there are more than a few options for breakfast and brunch lovers arriving on flights to London.
For a particularly ravenous start to your day, here are a few top recs for an equal parts high quality/high quantity breakfast (and brunch) in London.
Hawksmoor is a locally owned steakhouse with three popular restaurants in Central London. The latest of the meaty trio is located in the City (London’s financial district) near Guildhall.
The newbie resto is keen to get the word out about its breakfast menu and with its bloody Mary buffet, “anti-fogmatic” cocktail menu and more, it’s certainly worth a mention. At 15 quid (roughly $24), the Hawksmoor Full English is full-on a.m. feast with Plum Pudding bacon, sausage made with pork, beef and mutton, black pudding, fried eggs, hash brown, grilled mushrooms, roast tomatoes, trotter baked beans. Coffee is good, and service is swift and friendly. It’s a busy, masculine and massive space for any meal and probably the best option for a steak and egg brekkie in London.
Meat, meat, some other morning food stuffs, more meat and a pint – or more specifically “sweet cured bacon, pork and leek sausage, eggs (any style), grilled tomato, white and black pudding, hash browns, minute steak, lamb’s kidneys, baked beans, fried bread, chicken liver, mushrooms and a pint of Murphy’s stout: that’s the Fox & Anchor’s newly introduced “City Boy Breakfast.” The meal is an homage to the good old Smithfield Market days of early a.m. pub openings and filling brekkies for all-night workers. The City Boy costs £16.95 (about $27), and you’d have to have an exceptionally hearty appetite to clean your plate, and even two especially big city boys would probably be more than sated if sharing an order between them. The Fox & Anchor also offers comfortable and rather lush upstairs accommodation in the heart of trendy and Clerkenwell.
Does brunch count?
If it’s early enough, it’s essentially a late breakfast, right? Cookbook Cafe’s weekend brunch is a brilliant reason to give this Intercontinental London Park Lane restaurant a go. Just make sure you’re hungry when you do! Come here for the best pastrami outside New York, possibly the best Bloody Mary in London, a buffet-style market table offering a wealth of seasonal dishes, eggs (any style), freshly made waffles and pancakes, a carvery-centric (but veggie and pescatarian friendly) menu of mains and a tasty range of dessert options … and bottomless drinks. What’s the damage for such a feast? £49 (about $73). Not cheap but considering the quality, variety and sheer quantity of the food along with the unlimited drinks, brunch at the comfortable Cookbook Cafe (mere steps from Hyde Park for post-face-stuffing ambling) is excellent – and delicious – value for money.
These are but three mega-breakfast options. Beyond these, London offers a range of delicious morning-centric restaurants and cafes. Whether you’re just looking for a quick bite and some coffee to kick start your day or you’re hoping to savoury every moment of your morning, it’s never a bad idea to ask a local what’s good and popular for breakfast in the area where you’re staying or to simply sniff out a tempting waft of something tasty.
Got any other suggestions for a hearty breakfast in London? Let us know in the comments.
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