submitted by Doug Stokes

At the Monterey Historics last year friend of mine insisted that we head over to Seaside for breakfast at a place called The Breakfast Club. I was hungry and needed coffee pretty bad, and the place where we were staying (in Salinas!) already had a perfectly serviceable coffee shop right in the corner of its damn parking lot. Sure, it had a different name on it almost every time that I visited, but that was part of the charm, wasn’t it?

But then the slimy son-of-a-shoesalesman – he made me THE offer that no journalist can turn down. He sneakily offered to pay for breakfast!! In other words he was waving FREE FOOD in front of a confirmed automotive writer*, knowing that I would forego almost any hardship, use more gasoline, and even pay for parking (if I had to) for the grail.

In retrospect I would have paid double, and crawled there on my hands and knees had I known how good The Breakfast Club in Seaside is. Located in a standard-issue 1960’s shopping center, it might be easy to miss if it weren’t for my buddy’s insistence.

And I love the guy for it.

Everything on the extensive menu is served steaming hot and delicious. My Ortega chili/Swiss cheese omelet was even better than to write home about; it was to make plans (actually a blood oath) to be back for another even earlier the next morning before departing for LA!

This is coffee like that’s, you know, well, better than that fancy coffee place coffee. The real thing, rich, flavorful, and drinkable anyway you please from straight to Boston and anywhere in between.

And the hired help… Let’s see, how does young, energetic, clean, crisp, sweet, fun, scrubbed, bright, and friendly sound to you? Most of the wait staff are young high school or college kids who actually seem to like working at this place. Smiles go good with any good breakfast and the grins were wall-to-wall when we were there on a VERY busy, VERY demanding week-end full of car-snobs who were in town, being ultra-snobby.

It’s another one of those places that I’ll go out of my way to visit; or dream up some rational-sounding-to-me excuse to be in the vicinity of in the early morning hours, which takes some doing since I live East of LA in Duarte, California.

As it turns out this is not one of the most unique names for an eatery in the lexicon so I suggest that those who want the above to go to 1130 Freemont Street in Seaside (831) 349-3238. They don’t seem to have a website but they do sell coffee cups (One of which I’ve been using while writing this note).

Doug Stokes (Hey! thanks for making me go Mike!)

*our motto (and rallying cry), coined by the great Tim Considine is: “Eat Free or Die!”

Map to the Breakfast Club