White Spot – West Georgia

White Spot?! Yeah, I know what’s going through your simple little minds, “Why the hell would the hip, young twenty-somethings of Breakfast Armada stoop to slumming it with the Metamucil set at BC’s franchised version of an old folks home cafeteria?” Well, I can assure you that, unlike the continuing popularity of Adam Sandler, our story has a simple explanation. To commemorate my harrowing escape from the blood-thirsty clutches of many a deflowered Peruvian girl’s enraged father, the lads and I navigated our way downtown to set up camp on a sun-soaked patio. After twenty fruitless minutes of non-stop searching along Denman, desperation and fatigue began to overwhelm us. Teetering on the brink of prostration, it was all we could do to beach our puffy carcasses on the first phoney wicker chairs we came across. It just so happened that said phoney chairs were abundant at the White Spot on Georgia and Cardero and thus began another chapter in our thankless saga.

No sooner had we sat down, than we were informed by our antique hostess that brunch was only served until 11:00 am. After enlightening her to the fact that her proudly sported “I’m with the Pet Shop Boys” rat-tail hairdo was pronounced illegal in Missouri in 1983 (true story), I glanced down at my authentic Rolox watch and breathed a melancholy sigh. The Lustrium-plated hands read 11:15, decreeing that our breakfast choices would be limited to a scant few items still deemed to be servable by the White Spot higher-ups.

When the staff were pressed to explain the freakishly early cut-off time, they told us what we’re customarily told every time some lazy, two-bit, mom-and-pop operation tries to short-change us on our breakfasting hours: “Sorry, we can’t make pancakes anymore. We had to change the grill.” 

Excuse me, but what exactly the fuck are you talking about? Change the grill? Into what? I still have no idea what this means. Evidently it has something to do with burgers not mixing with pancake batter or some similarly asinine bullshit. Whatever the incomprehensible reason, the end result was that your faithful corespondents were so royally pissed that, were it not for the fact that we had already surpassed our exercise quota for the week, we’d have hightailed it down to the Marble Arch for some mugs n’ jugs. Not a good start. 

As the options were now few and far between, both Lang and The Duck had their arms twisted into going with the $7.49 Original Sunny Start Combo. Essentially a high-end Egg McMuffin, this caloric supernova consists of a fried egg, bacon and melted processed cheese on their “toasted signature bun” and is accompanied by mixed fruit. It also comes liberally drizzled with the infamous, enigmatic Triple “O” Sauce which, according to our exclusive insider source, is comprised of nothing more than mayonnaise and red relish. I actually make my own version of this condiment but I can rarely muster more than a Double “O” and it usually takes a good half hour between dollops. Anyway, the sandwich is apparently popular with visiting celebrities and, as such, Marlon Brando is rumoured to now be about 30% Triple “O” Sauce, weight by volume. 

Dang‘s Sunny Start arrived complete with visible thumb-prints in the bun and a whopping slab of processed cheese that obtruded from the roll with an uncanny resemblance to a slightly more orange version of Gene Simmons’ tongue. Having been weaned on Velveeta and Cheez Whiz, however, he recklessly dug in, proclaiming himself as well to be very down with the Triple “O”. His main gripe seemed to lie with the “pitiful” quantity of shredded hash browns he had ordered in lieu of the hazardously nutritious fruit. 

Our good friend, Duck-boy, like so many others in our city, has always professed an affinity for the Spot and couldn’t have been more pleased with his Sunny Start unless it had come with free passes to “Shower Power” night at the Odyssey. He even went as far as to declare it the “King of the Breakfast Sandwich,” a title which I felt he, being the Queen of the Breakfast Armada, had every right to bestow. His praise spilled over to his side of fresh fruit, and all in all I’d say the Duck was the happiest camper among our crew this morning.

Demanding a meal containing only the utmost in saturated fats, I eschewed the Sunny Start in favour of the Monty Mushroom Eggs Benedict which I more or less had to beg them to make as it was among the now-forbidden menu items. For some reason, the combo of Jack cheese, mushrooms, bacon, poached eggs and hollandaise just wasn’t working for me. Perhaps it was the exotic choice of foccacia bread as the starchy base; perhaps it was the manner in which the viscous hollandaise was shellacked onto my meal. It’s tough to put a finger on but I can easily tell you what was missing from my fruit salad: an appreciable amount of any type of fruit other than melon. 

I can’t help but wonder if any of you can empathize with how wearisome it becomes to be subjected, week after week, to lacklustre, melon-heavy fruit salads? Yes, I realize it’s cost-effective but for $9.49 is it really unreasonable of me to expect something other than a few orange wedges and token pineapple chunks? It’s summer, where the hell are the berries? How ’bout some mango? Nectarine, anyone? Snap! 

The service this morning was out of this world and by that I mean that it was so inhumanly bad that we postulated the staff might have been some type of alien-monkey hybrid. Instead of the customary individual server, my crew was subjected to some sort of Gene Roddenberry-contrived Borg-like service collective. Every five minutes or so, our previous waitress would be replaced by a fresh face, each uglier than the next, save for one cherubic, cutie-pah food runner (let’s call her Nine of Twelve) who giggled vacantly at our ineffectual attempts to chat her up. Over the course of an hour, you’d think that one of the dozen of them would have filled up our damn coffee mugs. However, this straightforward task appeared to be beyond the call of duty and we had nothing with which to wash our meals down apart from scorn and contempt.

I will grant that the scenery was enjoyable as the patio offered a nice view of Grouse Mountain and the resident Stanley Park bums awakening from their Friday-night rice-wine benders. There was no music playing and the trickle of the expensive looking fountain was drowned out by the din of the Georgia Street traffic, not two metres away. I almost wouldn’t have known I was at White Spot at all were it not for the mediocre food, wizened staff and close proximity of the blasé family casual décor adorning the interior of the restaurant.

So what else can I say about our Spotty experience? Well, I would like to have expanded a little on what I hear is a decent menu but I can only review from the choices we were given. While nothing we consumed made us cry, it’s safe to say that unless our 20 million dollar salary demands our met, we will not be returning for the sequel. Oh and here’s a little tip for the White Spot brass: people under eighty, on occasion, enjoy having French Toast after eleven a.m. on Saturday. I’m thinking a little market research with a target demographic younger than Bob Dole might be in order. But what do we know, we’re just paying customers. See you at the Bingo hall, suckers.

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The Sick & Dirty

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