Picnic Cafe — Restaurant in Brisbane City

First time visiting West End for a brunch. Thanks to my lovely fiancee wanted for a relaxing brunch date.

It was a great experience at Picnic Café, but probably some attention needed for the team to score higher rating, and here are how I rate:

Food: we ordered the Signature Scotch Egg and the Fritter Benedict.

The Scotch Egg is the one with boiled egg wrapped with beef (minced, I think) and the coating was bread crumbs. Size was pretty filling and the mash peas (not sure if the chef also added any avocado) very interesting taste. I mean positive interesting. With the shallot (onion), it lightened the richness from the food, and you would like more, and no worries.

The Fritter Benedict Good flavor of the fritter althrough a little dry. Poached eggs were gooey rather than runny which is slightly over cooked. Sauce can be a little too rich for this dish given the fritter was thick and creamy, but salmon was fresh enough which lights up the dish.

So the food rating: 5 for me and 4 for my fiancee, so it is 4.5

The drinks: we ordered the coffee house blended special (paper moon) long black and the Pink Flamingo.

Coffee is coffee, so I can't really comment much, especially it was long black I ordered. So, taste I won't rate. But the problem was the coffee delivered lukewarm, possibly forgot to deliver to the table. Therefore the crema pretty much disappeared... Or worst, it could be americano that was delivered...

The pink flamingo was pretty good, probably a bigger straw will be a bit tiny to suck the smoothy. And the ingredients might be a bit simple. Good for summer drink. Will rate more than 4, but probably not 5 yet.

Price: very reasonable at the location. Decent size of dish for brunch.

Service: honestly... This is where the points being taken away.

Because both drinks were delivered after the food, and it was only delivered after we asked the staff where the drinks were. Probably 5 mins after calling the staff.

The staff was kind of ignoring customer. Probably, he thought he only dropping the drinks to the table, and the was the only job... So... Probably the staff culture, or maybe the management team is targeting Instagram style café... (Staff were pretty decent looking).

Hence overall, 4 of 5 we would like to rate.

Still will recommend and come back, because there are few other dishes we would like to try.

PS: Sunday brunch was pretty busy, will suggest people to put the name down before you go for a quick...

First time I went the Wagyu scotch eggs were soooo delicious, juicy Wagyu and lovely soft boiled eggs on the inside. It was also max busy so was really impressed w the service, speed and delivery of dishes (no joke- it was packed inside and out we were the last seated). Second time I went my Wagyu scotch eggs were dry af like the meat was shrivelled up inside and not juicy (lol so sad) and my egg depressingly over cooked like you know when your egg yolk gets grey n powdery as you cut it (but it’s covered in the photo w sauce so you can’t see) so tbh Idk what happened there but whoever cut it and still served it defs knew that batch was.....yo. They also took out the pickle salad thing that helped to cut through the dish cuz it’s a foreal massive and generous serving which the scotch w the avo, sauce and hash is really dense hey, so if they haven’t already brought it back they should since it helps to cut through the richness of the dish.

Wagyu scotch egg incident aside- the other dishes we’ve had here have been good. I liked the croquette dish just as much as the scotch eggs. You probably won’t find another brunch place with as large a serving as picnic so despite the slightly higher than usual prices it’s worth it based on portions. I’m serious even between 3 of us we can’t ever finish 2 dishes LOL. Location is good and even if it’s packed you can leave your number and it’s pre quick turnover.

Overall I like this place but in general find the majority of the savoury dishes on the high calorie and ‘heavier’ aka ‘rich’ side (bar avo toast and their green healthy bowl dish forgot the name) so it’s hard to be in the mood for them in the morning when your appetite ain’t quite there. Their dishes are however...

We went for an early brunch, or was it late breakfast. There were only a few tables taken when we entered. Choosing a spot was easy.

The sign said, "Please wait here to be seated." We were greeted by someone behind the counter, with a smile. Acknowledging, we were there to eat. Pointed over to the table of the menu. Asked us to grab it ourselves and choose wherever we wanted to sit. I thought that was rather sloppy and lazy. Particularly when there was hardly anyone in the cafe, some attention would've been better.

We glazed over the menu. It all seemed delicious and almost hard to pick. Seafood will win all the time. We picked the swimmers crab with miso scrambled eggs, a coffee, a lyche crush, and a bowl of chips. (Our go-to side for breakfast is a must)

Table service was rather hit and miss. We were served after, and 2 other tables had arrived. We were a party of 2, when they were a party of 4 and 5. Another .5 star loss. My suggestion is, when you ask people to wait to be seated, you must usher them to their table of choice, then you won't get lost on who entered in first or when.

Drinks came out quite quickly, and food came shortly after. Well presented, showing quality, quantity, and value for money. We shared as usual, which we thought was perfect to satisfy our tummies.

It was all delicious 😋 even to order another lychee crush for on the go.

Definitely will return to try the other items...