Grondin Introduces a Weekend Brunch Menu

Brunch, just like lunch and dinner at the just-over-a-year old French and Latin restaurant, consists of familiar classics with a breath of the exotic.

Chorizo omelet (left) and French toast.

Grondin’s brunch cocktails—a smoked bloody mary and a hibiscus mimosa—sum up the restaurant’s new weekend brunch menu. Familiar classics with a breath of the exotic.

Grondin’s recently launched brunch menu, just like lunch and dinner at the just-over-a-year old French and Latin restaurant, showcases a restrained hand and impeccable technique. Favorites from the lunch menu, such as the charcuterie sandwich and torta de picadillo, remain. And there are new dishes, such as French toast, pillowy soft and light (words that rarely come to mind with most French toast), floating in a pool of maple syrup and weighted down with caramel walnuts. A chorizo omelet here is a thin sheet of egg and fresh herbs, wrapped around Grondin’s own crumbled and spiced sausage and cotija cheese. The eggs Benedict are textbook perfect. We ordered the Norwegian version, with smoked salmon, which we had no complaint with. But make sure Grondin’s house-cured ham finds it way, somehow, to your table. Perhaps in the Grondin Bennie, or maybe just by itself, as a side—this ham is as precious as prosciutto. It’s shaved thin, scented with chili and a handful of other spices that I know the chef has listed for me before, but I can’t remember a single one. But it doesn’t matter. You can’t exactly pick out all the individual spices, they just harmonize. (Or is it ham-onize?)

Our server, all Chinatown-cool with a Roberta Oaks aloha shirt and a fedora, hovers expectantly as we dig into our food. He really wants to know how we like the eggs. Turns out, they came from his family’s farm, HoaMoa Farm on the North Shore, and were gathered this morning. The eggs are delicious, but I think this is just as much the technique in the kitchen as the freshness of the ingredients. It’s for these reasons that we return to Grondin, day and night.

Grondin, now open for brunch on weekends, outdoor seating opening hopefully in a month. 62 N. Hotel St., 566-6768, grondinhi.com

Don’t forget to vote for your favorite Hale ‘Aina restaurants

​

READ MORE STORIES BY MARTHA CHENG