Another Broken Egg Café draws Southern inspiration, promises indulgent breakfast

PORT ORANGE — For those who think that the secret to a good breakfast is indulgence, the latest addition to the Port Orange Pavilion is worth a visit.

Another Broken Egg Café, the chain’s first in Volusia County, is looking to bring its unique take on the traditional breakfast menu and dining experience.

“The food is incredible,” said the restaurant’s general manager Tim Wood. “We celebrate indulgence, and we try to present the ‘wow’ factor.”

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The restaurant’s new Port Orange location opened Dec. 20, and the menu features many breakfast favorites as well as new creations that draw inspiration, in part, from the chain’s Louisiana origins.

The first location opened in 1996 in Mandeville, Louisiana, under its owner’s name, Ron Stuart. While franchising the restaurant, the owner and his partners decided the other locations would be called Another Broken Egg Café.

“It’s a Southern-inspired chef cuisine,” Wood said. “We have our own chef, Jason Knoll. He designs and creates everything we sell.”

In addition to the food, the restaurant features a bar, which adds a unique touch to the eatery's concept.

“We are a brunch café that also has a full bar,” Wood said. “We want to give you the OK to drink. It’s OK to come in and have a couple cocktails with your breakfast. You can’t ‘drink all day’ if you don’t start in the morning.”

Having a unique approach to the menu and to the restaurant experience is part of what sets Another Broken Egg Café apart, Wood said.

“It’s the kind of thing that if you do it really well, you stand out,” Wood said. “And I feel like we have.”

Menu of classics and indulgences

Some of the classic dishes offered at Another Broken Egg Café include eggs Benedict, huevos rancheros, and biscuits and gravy.

Sean Hughes visited the new restaurant with his wife and said that he walked in “grouchy and hungry” after skipping breakfast that morning and left “with a smile on my face.”

He had the smoked salmon Benedict — a bagel with cream cheese, smoked salmon, chopped onion (green onion, or chives), capers and a poached egg on top.

“Lacking the Hollandaise made it even tastier as I believe adding the sauce would detract from the flavor of the egg and salmon,” Hughes said.

Other traditional breakfast items, such as pancakes, French toast and waffles, can be found under “Indulgences” on the menu.

The restaurant offers the classic versions of these dishes, but customers can also try the Bourbon Street or lemon blueberry goat cheese pancakes; the French-toast style croissant with chocolate raspberry ganache; or the power waffle topped with bananas and a coconut-milk peanut-butter sauce.

Prices range between $10.99 and $15.99.

Wood said Knoll comes up with experimental dishes for each Another Broken Egg Café location that could eventually become permanent menu additions.

Two of these dishes offered now at the Port Orange location are the Boston cream pancakes (a cream-layered stack of three pancakes), and the guava jam French toast (filled with guava jam and topped with fresh raspberries).

Daytona Beach resident Joseph Manginelli used to live in North Carolina, where he was a frequent guest of his town’s Another Broken Egg Café. He said the “consistency of the menu items from store to store and state to state is quite impressive.”

“My personal favorite is their eggs Benedict,” Manginelli said. “There are a few variations of this and all are just perfect.”

He said that his family and friends have also enjoyed items like the Hey Lucy! Omelet (with chorizo, onions and green chilies), as well as the coffee options.

“Always looking forward to my next visit to Another Broken Egg Café,” Manginelli said.

'We’re really moving forward'

Wood said the community's response “has been great,” and that he expects the place to get “busier and busier once the word gets out.”

Wood has been in the restaurant business his entire career — starting as a server and moving up the ranks. Also the manager of other Another Broken Egg Café locations, Wood has been with the chain for four years.

Two years ago, an Orlando-based company purchased the franchise, Wood said, with the idea of expanding by 5-10% each year. The next step was opening a Port Orange location.

“They are looking at (bringing) new locations all over the Southeast at the moment,” Wood said.

The proximity of the new Port Orange location to the busy roads and expanding residential population all factored into the decision, Wood said.

“We’re close to the beach, close to Interstate 95, Interstate 4 is always a good place to go,” Wood said. “This is also a bedroom community. You have a lot of houses in the area, so we hope we do well.”

Wood said choosing the restaurant’s Lake Mary location, which opened in 2015 and which Wood has managed since 2018, followed similar criteria.

“We have grown exponentially in the last few years,” he said. “Sales growth, marketing growth, the design, it’s all there. We’re really moving forward.”

IF YOU GO

WHAT: Another Broken Egg Cafe

WHERE: 5527 S. Williamson Blvd., Port Orange

HOURS:7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday-Sunday

INFO: anotherbrokenegg.com/location/port-orange-fl or 386-320-7266

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Another Broken Egg Café opens at the Port Orange Pavilion