ozone

11 Leonard Street, EC2A 4AQ / Tube: Old Street, Moorgate

Price: £34

Food:

Eggs Benedict on Bubble and Squeak Cakes with Bacon & Bearnaise
Smoked Fish Kedgeree w/ a Poached Egg, Fried Shallots & Salsa Verde

Drink:

2x Flat White
Raspberry Milkshake

What we thought

That time of the week had come around again, trying to decide on the venue for our Sunday breakfast. Having scanned through our ever growing list of places to eat breakfast, we decided on Ozone in East London. Luckily for us Ozone, like many others coffee shops in London, and have an all-day breakfast, making that morning lie-in that little bit longer, which i never a bad thing. Ozone is a fast growing company and brand, recently voted ‘Best Newcomer’ at this years London Coffee Festival, Ozone is a well-established speciality coffee roaster, offering single origin, that express their “unique region, variety, careful harvesting in every cup”. Their shop on Leonard Street is not only a great place for a coffee, but also holds a great reputation for top quality food. Boasting a menu that is interesting and enticing using a fine selection of produce creating some truly delicious food.

Un-suprisingly it is busy when we arrive, we are offered a seat on the bar but decide to sit downstairs. They have really made the most of the space they have available, with the focus of upstairs being the kitchen and the beautiful Synesso coffee machine. The downstairs seems to be split between the roastery and more seating, making this an interesting environment to be in, with lots to look at. We took our seat on the end of a huge wooden table in what looked like a barista training room, and ordered 2 Flat whites to start. The menu is split into 3 sections, ‘Wake up’, ‘Lunchy things’ and ‘The eggs’. All contain classic dishes such as eggs, tomatoes, bacon and mushrooms, whiles also offering slightly more unusual choices such as fatuous with crispy pita, beetroot, radish, labneh and sumac. We decided on a fairly safe choice of eggs benedict and kedgeree. Given how busy Ozone was we were pleasantly surprised how quickly our coffees arrived, which were well up there with the likes of Kaffiene.Full of flavour, with the milk holding perfectly, right up until the final sip.Our breakfast was with us within 10 minutes, having not eaten anything that day we were very glad of this. The eggs benedict looked beautiful and was elegantly presented, slicing into the eggs the yolk oozed out over the bacon and potato cake perfectly, there’s nothing we hate more than a badly poached egg. The bacon was smokey, complimenting the sharp vinegary béarnaise and creamy yolk, the cut was thick so wasn’t as crispy as it could be, but added a certain meatiness which gave the dish real depth. The bubble and squeak potato cake sat in place of the traditional English muffin, this was crispy and soft inside, although we felt they were a little under seasoned but this may have been down to personal preference. Having had an excellent eggs benedict at The Modern Pantry we had high expectations and felt Ozone put up a pretty good fight, serving a delicious take on a classic which we happily ate every last bit of. We also ordered the smoked kedgeree with a poached egg, crispy shallots and a salsa verde. This was the perfect breakfast for a cold winters day, full of warming spices and smokey fish. The poached egg was sat on top like a jewel, and once broken wept over the rice like velvet. The portion was very generous, more than enough for just one person and easily shared between two. The crunch of the shallots and spring onion worked perfectly with the soft fish and tender rice, making this a pleasure to eat. As one of us finds it rather difficult to avoid temptation when it comes to a milkshake we could help ourselves and ordered one in raspberry, which was a first. This was served in a large chrome cup, probably the cup in which it was made. This was sweet, but verging on being almost to sweet. I would love to see how these are made and what they are putting into their shakes compared to Dirty Burger and Creperie Du Monde, either way it was pretty bloody good. We left Ozone very satisfied, feeling that our money was well spent and that we would definitely be visiting again. The standard to which everything at Ozone is delivered and executed is very high, we would recommend it to anyone who cares for great food and coffee.