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Restaurant Review - Brother Junipers - An Honest Review

Scott Roberts February 27, 2009 at 6:00 am Digg Share   Tweet  

Brother Juniper's Bakery and Restaurant in Memphis, TN has received numerous awards and accolades for being one of the top-notch breakfast places in the region. The following review is from my recent trip to Memphis when my wife and I visited to see if it really lived up to the hype. Does it? Not so much, unfortunately.

Brother Juniper's is located in an old part of town, not too far from the University of Memphis. The restaurant looks like it's a restored house adjacent to a dilapidated mini-mall. Brother Juniper's doesn't have much of a real parking lot of its own, so we were forced early on this Sunday morning to park in front of the rundown mini-mall's laundromat, which looked as if it could fall in on itself any second. The parking lot and sidewalk were strewn with trash (such as empty cardboard beer cases) which I had to literally walk around like an obstacle course just to make it to the front entrance.

Upon walking in, my expectations perked up a bit. Although the inside of the building was authentically old, it was decorated it a homey, quaint way (if not a "clean", modern way) with religious icons adorning the walls. Brother Juniper's also gives the impression of fashioning itself as a trendy, white-bread liberal eatery of sorts - the type of quasi-trendy urban haunt where people sit in front of their MacBooks as they sip their cappuccinos or chais and discuss how glutenous and evil Americans are. But make no mistake about it - this is NOT that kind of place. At it's heart exists an old-fashioned, down-home, religious, Southern feel that is only barely tinged by that quasi-trendy attitude, and because of this it gives Brother Juniper's its unique atmosphere.

The first place you enter after the cash register counter is a small gift shop area, with wooden cabinets stocked with Brother Juniper's own coffee, mugs, sauces, and jellies. To the right is one of the two dining areas and the kitchen. When we sat down at our table there were only a few other customers, but within twenty minutes the place was packed.

Upon studying the menu, we noticed it differed from the one on the website both in terms of prices and the food items they offered (yeah, we're weird in that we often prep ourselves for that). Brother Juniper's specializes in omelets (along with biscuits, gravy, potato dishes, and toast) and has a few dozen variations of the egg-based recipe. I opted for the open-faced Fireman's Special, which features eggs, chorizo sausage, avocado, jalapenos, green onions, shredded cheddar, shredded mozzarella, and mild salsa, along with a biscuit and cheese grits on the side. My wife ordered a Create Your Own omelet with eggs, bacon, and spicy cream cheese, plus some home fries and toast.

There was a LONG wait. We did our best to pass the time by mentioning we were back at Charlie Vergos' Rendezvous, consuming more of their life-changing dry ribs.

Our breakfast had finally arrived. The omelets were large, healthy and picture-perfect looking. My cheese grits looked nuclear orange, which prompted me to think - is there artificial coloring in this? My lone biscuit looked golden brown and fluffy. My wife, and the other hand, had poorer luck. Her milk had a small piece string of scum floating in, and smelled a bit sour. Worse, half of her home fries were blatantly overdone or burnt.

In the case of my omelet, the flavors were decent together. The chunks of chorizo by themselves had an "off" flavor to them. Have you ever eaten something and noticed a strange taste about it, where the food didn't necessarily go bad, but had an odd spice or ingredient that derailed the flavor? That's what the chorizo was like. A nice, spicy chorizo is good, but this wasn't. However, blended in with the other ingredients the funny taste was almost masked.

Heat-wise (and I must mention this when the name of the fiery dish is the "Fireman's Special") I would rate it 2 on a scale of 1 to 5, with a 1 being where you barely notice any spiciness and a 5 being an all-out scorch-fest, numbing your mouth, tongue, and esophagus and making you sweat bullets for a half-hour straight. Of course, most of the spice was derived from the jalapeno peppers. There were two pepper sauces on the table - Brother Juniper's own Louisiana Chipotle and Traditional Hot Sauces - so had to try 'em on a couple of bites. The one I preferred was the Louisiana Chipotle; it's smoky essence went well with the eggs and sausage. Overall, I wasn't thrilled with the omelet, and I can honestly tell you that even some of my semi-novicely-made egg creations at home had turned out better than BJ's.

The biscuit and grits were outstanding, and I had wished my breakfast had consisted entirely of this.

My wife didn't think too much of her omelet. She said the spicy cream cheese wasn't hot or spicy at all, and tasted as if it had been left unrefrigerated for several hours. She ate what she could of her un-burned home fries. But she loved the fresh, homemade toast. Perhaps this restaurant can shift it's focus totally to baking just breads and biscuits, something it seems like they're much better suited at. Yes, I utter this in partially-facetious tones, but it's still worth a wish, isn't it?

Brother Juniper's employees were friendly, even if they tiptoed on the brink of slow and lousy service. A case in point: I had politely asked our waitress, a pleasant, middle-aged woman, for refill on my coffee. Minutes passed, and still no refill. There was even a time where the waitress stood not even fifteen feet away from where we sat, fidgeted with empty plates and saucers while doing nothing else. When we were nearly done with our meals did she finally come back over to our table where I had to repeat my request for more coffee. Perhaps this is trivial, but it's little things like this that can take a mediocre experience and turn it into a miserable one.

Brother Junipers Official Website : http://www.brotherjunipers.com