Egg on Toast of the year 2023

EoT January update

Back in 2020 I started my search for egg of toast of the year EoTotY and had had some excellent EoT on the way.

Then something called a pandemic happened, I think it got a mention on the news, and the competition got abandoned. Even at the start of 2022 there was still lockdown talk in the air but I’m now confident the search can restart.

I’m hoping to try at least 50 EoT over the year so need to do 4 or 5 a month. January started well but then ice and snow took a couple of weeks out so in the end only 4 EoT rides were possible so here are the ones I did try.

First up was the Gardeners kitchen at Green Pastures garden centre on the Lowestoft Road. This is always a top venue for a bike ride as you can wheel the bikes into the garden centre area for safety and they have one of the finest cake selections around. 

However today was all about EoT. I had with me a top team of fellow cyclists who would also be trying out the Green Pastures offering and whose opinion I planned to ignore.

The challenge here was that we had to work off the breakfast menu to acquire EoT but it finished at mid day and it was currently 11.59. I flagged down a passing waitress to highlight our dilemma and she was soon on-side and rushed our order in before confirming chef was prepared to do it even though we would be actually eating our breakfast item past the deadline. Phew.

The sour dough toast to egg ratio seemed a bit wrong and presentation was lacking but the eggs were good and overall a high scoring opening to the comp.

The next venue visited was the Green Grocers in Norwich. The original plan was a ride out to Mattishall but as it was pouring with rain I met up with my regular EoT crew at our nearest cafe. However EoTotY rules clearly state you must cycle to the cafe before rating so I still got a drenching cycling the two miles from home.

Again an excellent offering with bonus mushrooms but the sour dough was a bit on the hard side. However it did go top of a very small league.

Next I teamed up with Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please). He had been a bit poorly so we just went for a short 20 mile loop to the excellent Reepham station cafe on the Marriot’s way. Another cafe which always delivers on a cycle ride and a staple destination for me.

Here we once again we hit the breakfast menu timing issue as we were a good 20 mins past the published breakfast deadline. Also there was no poached available but chef agreed he would fry me some eggs and scramble Andrew his.

As we waited for our EoT Andrew dropped a bombshell as he said he had decided to no longer be hard to please. I reminded him that he had told me this every January since we start cycle cafe reviewing 10 years ago so I wouldn’t be holding my breath.

Once the EoT had arrived he was refreshingly hard to please about it as he doesn’t like bread out of a packet.

We both agreed the eggs were excellent but packet sliced bread is never going to win EoTotY.

The final outing in January was also with Andrew and this time to Byfords in Holt. It was during the cold snap so the roads were only just rideable. Holt has a lot of good cafe options but Byfords is the most famous and has some excellent takeaway cake.

The egg on toast came with smashed avocado on English muffin. As per this months other cafes the eggs were excellent. But the avocado was bland and the muffin rock hard and was almost impossible to cut. All in all very disappointing especially as it was twice the price of any other EOT.

So that covers month 1. Hopefully with better weather I can get a lot more EoT reviewed in February 

Cafe	Month	Toast	Egg	Presentation	Overall taste/enjoyment	Total
Green grocers	January	7	8.4	7	16.9	39.3
Gardeners kitchen	January	7.5	8.6	5.6	16.1	37.8
Byfords	January	5	8	7.9	15.8	36.7
Reepham station	January	6.1	8.3	6.7	15	36.1