I’ve always preferred brunch over breakfast. Breakfast is just too early of a concept for me to grasp—just like school, work, church, jury duty, and all other things that start before noon. But I prefer sleeping in until 3 p.m.—that’s why breakfast for dinner is my jam. Get it? Jam? Breakfast? Never mind. Unfortunately for me, Cowgirl Café in Nipomo closes at 2 p.m., so “brinner” (or “dreakfast”) was not an option.
What I’m about to describe was my first experience at Cowgirl Café, which has a sister location in San Luis Obispo that I’ve also never been to. I wonder if there is a Cowboy Café I just haven’t heard of yet—technically that’d be considered a “brother” location, right? Either way, I see a politically correct chain of “Cow-Person” Cafés in the near future.
I met three friends at the Cowgirl Café in Nipomo to put some heads together over their breakfast spread. They all wished to remain anonymous, so I’ll be referring to my three amigos as Friend 1, Friend 2, and Friend 3. I was the second person to arrive at Cowgirl Café—friend 1 was sitting in his car waiting for us when I got there. Friend 2 and Friend 3 arrived shortly after that.
We stepped inside the Cowgirl Café. “Sit anywhere you like,” the hostess said right away. The Western-themed dining room was completely empty, but I’m assuming this is the case at Cowgirl most Wednesday mornings. Breakfast time on weekends is probably a much different story, at least according to one of the signs posted by the front counter. I don’t recall the exact wording, but the sign said something along the lines of: Large parties will not be seated until each member of the party is present.
There was another sign that said: Sign in at the counter! Signing things is one of my favorite hobbies so I investigated the front counter but couldn’t find any sign-in sheet. Why would Cowgirl Café lie to me? I hoped their menu wasn’t as dishonest—I trusted the disclaimer above the omelet selection: Prepared with cheese.
My faith was rewarded when I received my CHEESE, bacon, tomato, and mushroom omelet with hash browns and toast. Friend 1 ordered pork chops with eggs and upgraded from toast to biscuits and gravy. Friend 2 ordered the 2+2 breakfast (what a coincidence), which includes two eggs, two pancakes, two sausage links, and two strips of crisp bacon. Friend 3 ordered the Giddy-Up breakfast which includes three eggs, two pieces of Canadian bacon, two regular pieces of bacon, two sausage links, potatoes, and toast. I got full just typing all that.
Friend 3 didn’t stop there though; he added a side order of grits. I didn’t know what grits were, and I still don’t fully comprehend them, to be honest. None of us had any complaints though, or at least it appeared that way. We were all too busy scarfing down our food to verbalize. But isn’t that the best compliment
of all?
Oh and I forgot to mention the variety of beverages at our table. I had coffee, Friend 1 had water, Friend 2 had orange juice, and Friend 3 had milk. I was kind of sad because my drink was the only one not in a mason jar. I should have asked for one though—there are much weirder things than coffee to drink out of a mason jar.
Caleb Wiseblood is too lazy to Google what grits are. Send him the definition via Editor Shelly Cone at scone@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Dec 15-22, 2016.