Huckleberry's Breakfast & Lunch — Restaurant in Escondido

So disappointed to have to give a poor review to an anticipated breakfast place.

My family loves brunch and was waiting for this new place to open. We finally made it out for Father's Day and it was expectedly packed. I was told by several people that the wait times were exaggerated they were right. 45 minutes quoted was really just 20.

We had a nice booth. Even though we have tons of concerns none of them are about the staff. Our waitress Christy was nice and all the other staff seemed kind and attentive.

To start with the coffee maker broke. Tough luck on Father's Day but we rolled with it. Husband got a Bloody Mary that he said was great. The other alcohol options were limited I know I at least saw three types of mimosas flutes that were $6.95 I believe.

We ordered the beignets which were a complete disappointment after having lived in Mississippi for a year. They came out fast but instead of being a giant Puff, It was a solid mass of dough with no air inside. The dough even felt raw or under baked in the center. Our kids took one bite and didn't want more. I didn't either. Also the vanilla pudding that it was placed on top of tasted worse than hospital stuff. We saved the berries that it came with after our waitress advised that getting berries put on top of my daughter's pancakes from the children's menu would cost an extra $2.50. she ended up not wanting too after tasting it.

The bathrooms were clean and had a wheelchair accessible stall. If I recall it had a baby changing station but I was pretty distracted trying to entertain hungry 5-year-old twins.

It took an hour to get our food. 3 out of 4 of our plates were cold. Our son got piping hot chicken and waffles off the kids menu. So good for him. The rest of us had cold food. I got a po-boy where the sauce had almost certainly showed signs of being microwave. The shrimp was barely lukewarm. My husband said the flavors were great on his Cajun Benedict but everything was cold. My fries were cold and congealed reinforcing the fact that they were probably microwaved. The consistency felt really weird. Even my kids didn't want them.

Overall, the service was great, the ambience and location shows a lot of promise. The recipes seemed like they would be great, but without tasting the food hot, I feel cautious about endorsing it. Overall, the chefs need to be fired, replaced, or at least retrained. They don't know timing at all and could be bested by a Denny's chef. I'm not the only person here who had the same complaints and I shouldn't leave a restaurant hungry.

Maybe we'll give it a try again in 6 months to a year. But we would probably listen to the reviews next...

Started off great. Called to confirmed hours, spoke with Connor, confirmed they are open until 3pm. When my wife and I arrived we was seated instantly, the place was pretty occupied, but not at capacity. (We went at 10:30am on a Wednesday) as we are seated we was asked "is this your first time here?? I'm thinking either they know their regulars or this is standard greeting - regardless, it's very impressive. In addition to being greeted the hostess educates us on the favorites (1. Big Easy chicken Benedict 2. Beignets) I ordered the scramble, and an order of beignets and chicken strips to go. My wife ordered a Huckleberry lemonade 👍🏽and Mississippi Skillet add andouille sausage.

Received our food in 18 minutes. This is were it went from an A+ to a D- fast! The first thing was residue all over the bottle of pepper sauce. They have cameras, you can see me changing our bottle that was marinated with dried up residue on the exterior with the table directly to my right. We finally get our food..20 minutes wait, the food must be piping hot..right? WRONG! My fried chicken breast, was fresh 🔥 however, not seasoned! 😩, this is not a non-negotiable, but my eggs having a funny taste and being cold is! 🥶 Runny eggs with and odd flavor with lukewarm red style potatoes is no bueno! Our server was very impressive, remembering my wife's order with no pen and paper, Big time tip! But passing us 7 times without asking once..how are you? How is your food? Do you need anything else? Your to go items are almost done... nothing, thats an instant 50% deduction off your tip. Our hostess was Miriam, she never asked how was our experience, she did however get my check with the upmost urgency. We paid the bill, left and plan to never return.

Very unfortunate because the theme and vibe there was great! We love Cajun food, my wife's peoples are Cajun (from S.E.Louisiana to Western Mississippi) but I would never imagine getting cajun food lacking flavor. It's a sad culinary experience when my carmel macchiato and honey mustard aioli was the best thing I consumed today.

Saddest regards,

A real "Foodie" and...

Ate breakfast several weeks ago and it was very good. However, my husband and I ate breakfast on Dec 3, 22 and had the same food we ordered previously. Unfortunately our experience and food was lackluster. We arrived around 8:00 am and the place was almost empty. We were seated in a dark cold room. We asked to be moved to the nice sunny warm room and were accommodated. We waited about 15 minutes for someone to ask if we wanted coffee and then waited some more for the coffee. We waited for our server to take our order and that was a long time. Then our server basically disappeared. She finally reemerged so we could order and then we waited another 20 minutes or so for our food. Overall the food was cold, the special potatoes I paid extra for were undercooked and hard. One slice of potato had a nasty rotten place about the size of a quarter in it. We ate a small portion of our food commenting to each other that we were disappointed so we asked for take out containers. My husband took the leftovers and “doctored” them up today and our leftovers were so much better than the $40 breakfast we received yesterday. We never complained and we gave our sever the benefit of the doubt, maybe she was new. By the time we left it seemed that the rest of the staff showed up for work and the place got busy. Not sure why the major dysfunction when we arrived earlier. Huckleberry’s will have to step up their game if they plan to stay in business. We will probably go to the original pancake house next time. They always serve food right away, hot, delicious...