Review: Chez Leon in St. Louis and Jimmy's on the Park in Clayton

The approach of winter, as evidenced by the crisp chill in the morning air denying the first impression of warmth offered by a bright sun, or the cascade of red, orange and yellow leaves herded by a sharp gust of November wind, also signals the perfect season for a hearty breakfast or, if you like to sleep in a little, a hearty brunch.

And brunch is a rapidly growing element in the St. Louis dining scene.  There are more, and better, brunches in River City town today than there were a few years ago, and though the Guru looked at brunches only four months ago, more have come along.  A few are on both Saturday and Sunday, but the vast majority is on the latter day.  I love the foods of breakfast and brunch, but to avoid a sharp chiding from my conscience, I'm glad we can go all out only one day a week.

Jimmy and Leon, to use the familiar, are among the newer brunch offerings in the city, and both are excellent, with the former providing a cilantro-lime hollandaise sauce that was among the best I've tasted anywhere, and the latter offering eggs meurette, a delicious offering perhaps appearing for the first time on a St. Louis menu. Both restaurants are first-rate operations, with excellent service and attention to detail, and brunch prices are comparable.  Chez Leon is in the Central West End, in a storefront painted a red similar to that of a side of smoked salmon, and with hints of a Parisian bistro here and there in the decor and fittings.  Jimmy's Café on the Park, across the street from Concordia Seminary on a quiet Clayton street, is decorated with caricatures of people, the large majority of which fit my long-time description of the Stan Musial statue outside Busch Stadium – it looks neither like Musical nor like art.

There's a warm feeling to both establishments, where white tablecloths are the style.  Leon, with large French doors (the accepted door style for a French restaurant, of course) facing Laclede Avenue, has a few tables in the doorway and a few more outside, waiting patiently for warmer weather.  Jimmy's has room for some sidewalk tables, too.

When I think about brunch, I place a heavy emphasis on the first two letters of the word rather than the last three.  After all, it's the first real food of my day (juice and coffee don't count) and even if it's not until 10:30 or 11 o'clock, I'm still thinking in terms of breakfast and not of lunch.

Both Jimmy's and Leon offer excellent egg dishes, which I consider the key to the meal – as noted, Jimmy's added a bit of lime and cilantro to its hollandaise, turning a superior sauce into a superb one.  Leon offers eggs meurette, or eggs poached in red wine and served on top of bacon. The wine, its alcohol reduced to almost nothing by the cooking process, adds both flavor and some lovely color to the dish.    And both cooks were in a mellow groove with the poaching process, resulting in  eggs that gave up lots of liquid yolk without a runny white.  They were fresh and tasty, and as far as I'm concerned, prepared right to the moment.

Of course, man does not live by egg alone, especially at brunch.  Canadian bacon is served as the traditional accompaniment to eggs benedict, and the English muffins were properly toasted.

Chez Leon also offers eggs Florentine, which arrive on a bed of spinach; a smoked pork chop with scrambled eggs; and French toast or potato pancake with bacon or house-made sausage. The smoked chop has a flavor and texture similar to Canadian bacon. Lox and bagels, and a delicious salad Lyonnaise round out the breakfast choices.  The salad, a French tradition from the southern Burgundy city of Lyon, long known as the place where the French go to eat, involves chunks of bacon on standard greens under a vinaigrette dressing that has hints of bacon flavor.  A couple of poached eggs sit atop the whole thing. Escargot, pate, onion soup and a beet-and-Roquefort salad also are available, as are creamed sweetbreads on toast, a splendid brunch idea, and a wide selection of French cocktails or aperitifs. Creme caramel, chocolate mousse and lemon tart are on hand for those who consider a sweet as the only proper ending to any meal.

The French toast was tasty, but is made with a sweetened batter bread and simply doesn't need additional syrup or other sweet toppings beyond a small cloud of powdered sugar which arrives on top. The house-made sausage is slightly sharp, with a hint of sage, and is first-rate.

Jimmy's has seven items that I'd consider lunch dishes, plus a few specials for children, like eggs McJimmy's, or scrambled eggs, bacon and American cheese on an English muffin with fried potatoes.

On the breakfast side, the establishment has its own take on some items, like using a croissant as the base for French toast, or a tenderloin benedict, which covers the English muffin with a grilled tenderloin, poached egg and hollandaise sauce, in bottom-to-top order. Eggs Christina begin with poached eggs on a muffin, and finish with smoked salmon and hollandaise.  Derek's omelet involves spinach, bacon and goat cheese, and another includes cheddar, American and mozzarella cheese.  Crab cakes and eggs neither get nor need any fancy nomenclature.  The cakes are not all lump crabmeat, but with enough crab to provide good flavor and texture, and the citrusy tang of the lime-cilantro hollandaise set it all off in superior style.  Hash-brown potatoes are cut into small cubes, well-cooked and benefitting from almost enough onions.  I know some people who think there never are enough onions, just as I think there never are enough mushrooms.

Crepes can fit with either breakfast or lunch, and Jimmy's are made with chicken, mushrooms and white grapes, plus a white wine-lemon-sage cream sauce. Buttermilk pancakes and lox and bagels, plus a crabmeat quiche round out a rather extensive selection.

French toast made with croissants was a new idea to me and it was satisfactory, though the croissant made for a toast sweet enough not to need syrup.  Bacon on the side was lean, crisp and flavorful.

Speaking of French toast, my own favorite, available only by my hand in my kitchen, is a savory style, with sharp salsa and even a little Chinese hot oil beaten into the eggs, the bread (one slice for one egg) well-soaked and the entire thing cooked slowly so that there's a bit of a rise, almost like an omelet.

Service at both operations is smooth and capable, and the great advantage to a good brunch is that it makes for an easier nap in front of the television set when the football game becomes dull.