Angie's - 47 Erb St W, Waterloo

4	50%	2.9	2.5	2.5

I went to Angie’s on November 14th with Dave and a bunch of my coworkers. We chose a busy morning, unfortunately - it was the same day (and just a bit before) the Santa Claus parade in Uptown Waterloo, so every parking lot and space, for about a kilometre around, was full. However, there were several tables available, and my fellow diners had a large one waiting when I arrived.

Angie’s is a Waterloo institution - established in 1962, there is a bakery in-house that supplies breakfasts with fresh bread and customers with takeaway pastries. The restaurant was recently renovated with black leather upholstery, lots of windows, and many tables (not so many booths), and decorated with mounted articles about the area on its walls. It is a reasonably nice place to eat, although I found it a bit dark in spite of all the natural light.

The server was understandably a bit flustered by people arriving to our table at different times, and while she was very friendly about it, we were short several cutlery settings and coffees for a significant portion of the meal.

Gabby ordered a melt with no eggs - sausage, bacon, ham, peppers, onions, and lots of cheese on breakfast potatoes - which she said was “phenomenal.”

Jesse ordered a Ruben sandwich, which he said was one of the first good Rubens he has had in town; he also had Melissa’s eggs (scrambled), since she eats potatoes and toast for breakfast?

Melissa had the no-meat special, but gave her eggs to Jesse. She was especially excited about her whole-wheat toast, which was fresh from their in-house bakery.

Shayna ordered orange juice and french toast - 4 pieces, which were very fluffy and tasted great.

Dave and I went into this breakfast with our eyes open - both of us have had bad experiences at Angie’s before, with long waits, order errors, and poorly cooked food. I got the no-meat special and was pleasantly surprised - it included delicious homemade rye toast, fresh farmers’ eggs (the yolks were so yellow!), homemade jam, and some of the best potatoes I’ve had so far - crispy skinned, cooked in-house, and seasoned perfectly.

Dave ordered the Waterloo County Breakfast (a standard meat special with Krug’s Farmer’s Sausage), but they forgot to bring the sausage, and when he finally got it, it wasn’t cooked through. This did not help his opinion of the restaurant, but at least they only charged him for a no-meat special.

It is pretty clear both why Angie’s has maintained its status in Waterloo and why its scores on various rating sites are poor - when the food and service are good, it’s great; when they’re bad, they screw up pretty spectacularly.

SCORECARD

Atmosphere	Price	Variety	Taste	Flexibility	Service
4	3.5	4.5	3.75	4	3.5
Cleanliness	Special		Flavour		Courtesy
4	8.99		4		4
Ambience	Coffee		Cook		Speed
4	1.99		3.5		3
	Pancakes		Coffee
	8.99 (for 2)		3.5
	Plain Omelette		Potatoes
	7.99 (0.99/item)		4.5

TOTAL SCORE: 3.75