BRENDA'S FRENCH SOUL FOOD - SAN FRANCISCO, CA

I was researching brunch places in San Francisco when I came across Brenda's Fresh Soul Food. I read that it was one of the must-eats brunch in San Francisco. Since I rarely eat Soul food I thought it was be a good try. We came here on a weekday around 12 pm and waited around 20 minutes for our table. When we were seated, we realize the restaurants started to get empty when it was closing 1pm. It seems people like to start their lunch early here.

For appetizer we got the Crawfish Beignets as it is one of the signatures. It came in a order of 3 and it made me wonder how parties of two can handle this because this piece of devil IS FILLING! It was topped with chili pepper flakes which made it kind of messy to eat. The filling was not as much as I expected but the crawfish and cheese was super tasty and rich. The bread itself was very soft and delicious, they have their homemade jam (apple and strawberry) on the table and you can use as much as you want on your beignet. To be honest, by the end of this I was already feeling a little full.

For main course, I actually wanted the eggs benedict, but unfortunately that's only available on the weekends. So I went for the Hangtown Fry. It's actually an omelette but on the menu it says it's a scramble. I think it's about personal preference with this dish because while the taste was great with oyster, bacon and scallion I am not a fan of super-cooked eggs, and this omelette was one of them. The cream biscuit is delicious especially with their homemade jam! Can't go wrong.

We also tried the Catfish Po'boy and the Oyster Po'boy. The oyster was my personal favorite. The way they fried the oyster made it so crispy! If you love oyster, then this is your to-go dish. The catfish was not bad as well, but for me oyster hands down! I think they do their fried food really good here, made me wished I ordered some fried chicken as well. Their portion was way too big and none of us were able to finish our food. I recommend sharing 1 dish with two girls or 2 dishes (plus beignets) for 3 people.

Overall, I would recommend Brenda's to someone who really likes fried food. Well duh, this is soul food haha.

Tip: Come here around 12:30 on weekday to wait for the crowd to die out.