Salt and Pepper, 268 Lincoln St. (April 19)

Overall impression:  Good food, great space.  A nice option if you are in the neighborhood for breakfast or lunch.

https://www.facebook.com/salt.pepper.breakfast.lunch

  Salt and Pepper is right across the street from UMass Memorial, Hahnemann campus. This is not far from our house (5 min drive,  or a very long walk), so it was worth a try. I've been curious since the restaurant space changed hands a couple years ago - from the outside it looked like a lovely remodel. However, though it was on my list of places to go it was never very high on that list. (Kind of like the movie that is perpetually at #40 in our netflix queue.) Maybe because it never looked too busy from the outside. But in this case looks were deceiving - it was full of people at 10 am on a Sunday.

The interior lived up to my expectations - it was very lovely. Or maybe just my style. Soothing modern black and gray, a long bar and many wooden tables kind of squished together. Plus a bench seat with cool cushions along one wall. More ambience than other places I've gone for eggs and toast (we didn't try lunch). Eric pointed out that the soundtrack left something to be desired. Or, just wasn't our style (Casey Kasem in reruns or greatest hits). But hey, I hadn't heard 9 to 5 for a while, and sometimes you gotta go with Dolly Parton.

There seemed to be only one very busy waitress, so it took some time before we could place an order. But once the order was in the food was out - in about 5 minutes. I had my usual (eggs, toast, potatoes - all just fine), our friend Melissa had her usual (eggs benedict - good) and Eric had the same as me, but with Kielbasa. I'm a vegetarian, and I tell you his Kielbasa looked pretty good. He was very pleased.

There are a few drawbacks - Salt and Pepper isn't handicapped accessible (I don't know if there was a non-stairs entrance in the back, but the restroom is only reachable via steps). There wasn't jam on the table (we could get strawberry or grape if we asked), and the bathroom wasn't that clean (not disgusting or anything, just needed some sweeping and restocking). This could be due to being short staffed. For basically taking care of the entire place our waitress did a great job.

Maybe in the summer I will go back for morning coffee or a noontime break from gardening. It is a 30 minute walk from our house, which should be perfectly fine in the sunshine. Happy this neighborhood place is there.