NYC's Best Egg Breakfasts: BEC, Shopsin's, Egg Shop, More
After bagels, nothing quite says breakfast in New York like an egg on a roll with a coffee. Forego your neighborhood bodega or coffee wagon for the restaurants below, which serve up some of the best egg breakfasts in the city. They're all eggcellent. In fact, you might even say we're eggstatic about them! By Jessica Allen.
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In recent years, several mono-focused restaurants have opened around the city. These spots zero in one ingredient or set of related ingredients. BEC specializes in "bacon, egg, and cheese." Their lengthy sandwich menu includes the "spicy Spaniard," with Manchego cheese, tomato compote, romaine, serrano ham, and pickled jalapenos on a Pugliese roll -- while the "junior BEC" comes with Applewood smoked bacon and cheddar cheese on a mini ciabatta roll. Most importantly, both feature all-natural, cage-free eggs cooked over easy.
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The very popular Egg in Williamsburg has crowds galore, hungry for a taste of its breakfasts and brunches. The restaurant opens early (7 am on weekdays), so set the alarm and get a jump on all the sleepyheads out there who wait until 8. As you'd expect from the name, eggs get the star treatment: hard-boiled and served atop sweet pea grits, poached and slathered with ham, scrambled with cheese and nestled against duck hash or over-easy alongside ciabatta croutons, radicchio, and house-made cotechino (similar to salami.)
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Owners Sarah Schneider and Demetri Makoulis fell in love for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which was a shared passion for egg sandwiches. Fast forward a few years, and today they run an egg-centric restaurant on the Lower East Side. It's open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so you're covered no matter what time the craving for a great egg hits. DIYers and picky eaters will fall for the "custom egg and cheese" section, which lets you design your perfect egg sandwich. Customers can select the style of egg, cheese, bread, and sauce, along with add-ons like house-made maple sausage and heirloom tomatoes.
Nana's Breakfast Nook specializes in hearty, fortifying breakfasts, with a reliance where possible on organic ingredients, including free-range eggs. The Howard Beach restaurant's version of a BLT includes arugula, field greens, smoked bacon, and Vermont cheddar, while the "southern charmer" comes with poached eggs, sausage gravy, bacon bits, and biscuits. Another option? A three-egg omelet with mushrooms, spinach, and Gouda. Oh, and start with the brûlée grapefruit, in which the fruit gets rubbed with ginger and raw sugar and gently torched.
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Whatever you've heard about Shopsin's, it's likely true. The menu? Incredibly long—almost limitless in fact, ranging from kati rolls with brisket, to bacon grilled cheese to so-called Texas egg rolls, to Asian beef soup. The owner/main chef? Very surly, indeed. He doesn't hesitate to toss out folks who don't abide by his rules. The food? So good, so so so good -- a creative combo of salt and sweetness hitting the pleasure center in your ancient lizard brain. Try the "Adobe," an egg burrito served with coconut pancakes, or the "Pig Newton," with grits, sausage, eggs, and fig gravy.
