It appears I'll be the lone dissenting voice here so far, but I'm beginning to get used to that. I guess that's what compelled me to write this. I walked out of this place this morning with the feeling that I just don't belong here. It's odd, because I agree that the food is fresh and flavourful, the service was fairly prompt, and the place was clean and bright and cheery. So what's my problem, you might wonder? Well, I'll start by saying that clean and bright and cheery really means bland suburban nothingness to me. I want a little grit and character when I go out to eat. I don't need sawdust on the floor and flies buzzing around the head of the chain smoking ex-con with the mattted beard and bloodshot eyes who cooks the food, but I want to feel like I'm eating breakfast at home, with a chef who at least has a sense of humour. This place has no sense of anything, and the colour scheme and general decor made me think of a daycare center, not a "breakfast joint". The staff are polite, well trained automatons, which seems just fine for most folks, but just sort of bores me and leaves me feeling cheated in the human interaction department. So yes, we've established that I am not the target demographic for Cora, and I promise I will go away once I finish this review, but first I want to mention the one thing that really was the breaking point and prompted this review. My breakfast consisted of eggs benny, a regular sized glass of orange juice, and a small cup of passable coffee (though I'm sure it was organically grown and harvested by fair trade monks somewhere high in the mountains of South America or some such thing). For this I was charged $21.00! I am not cheap, and I have absolutely no problem paying a bit more for quality food and service, but this is absurd. I'm sure part of this is to cover the labour costs involved in cutting all that fruit into all those pretty geometric shapes, but I simply cannot justify this. So this place will put a dent in De Dutch across the street, which has been in steady decline for years now, and I'm sure that's the division they want to be playing in, and I wish them all the luck in the world. Cora is a restaurant for people who see nothing ridiculous about paying someone a premium to walk their dog or marinate their steaks for them, but it's not for me. Disappointing because I wanted to be bowled over and make this place a regular stop. I guess I just have to admit that my world and the world where places like Cora exist are growing further apart every day. Somewhere between Mel's Diner and Cora there has to exist the great breakfast place, where the food is great, the service is great and human, and the price is fair. Until that place comes along, I'll be at home, cutting my own fruit, poaching my own eggs, and grinding my own coffee, waiting. But look on the bright side, that means one less person in the lineup and one more available chair at Cora. read more