Hidden by an unmarked entrance on an otherwise quiet East London backstreet was Bistrotheque. I discovered it's a French cafe/restaurant (I suppose the name is suggestive) and coincidentally or not the wait staff were mostly seemingly French too. There's a piano in the corner and on this morning, a lunchtime musician started playing his melodic version of classics such as Britney "Baby one more time".
The menu reads quite nicely. There's a bit of chaos within the structure and the ingredients belie French upon other influences - souffle, black truffle, foie gras, tartare with labneh, cornbread and chorizo. Suffice to say many of the items sound excellent. The eggs and pancakes seem to be the best value, as the mains do tend to be quite highly priced.
- Bistrotheque Breakfast (sausage, bacon, Boston baked beans, layered potato, eggs, toast) £13.5 - remarkably good layered potato (as a modern version of hash brown), strongly flavoured crisp bacon, some nice beans, and a poached slightly vinegared egg was served with toast. The sausage looked rather wrinkled but was adequate.
- Black pudding £4 - I had this as a side to my breakfast but unfortunately it was below par. The flavour was too minimal and had none of the rich pork meat, fat & blood that it is supposed to;
- French toast, berries, almonds, Chantilly cream £9 - a beautiful dish decadent in sweetness and colour. Not overly sweet with unnecessary syrups but using berries instead for the breakfast treat.
Other than the black pudding and the lack of smoothies/juices (I suppose they aren't typical French brunch items), the other two were very fine starts to the day. I think the only other options I'd consider as breakfasts would be the cauliflower, mojo verde, smoked almonds £17 or tomato tarte tatin, goats curd, crispy shallots £17, whereas heavier lunch options would be more suited to later in the day.