Tampa Bay Brunch Tour - Piquant in Hyde Park

Piquant Hyde Park has made a name for itself over the  past year. The first location in Tampa to offer Cronuts, a croissant-donut hybrid which is flying off the shelves in Tampa faster than mardi gras beads during Gasparilla. Piquant was a brand new location when our Best of the Bay Brunch got together and we were ecstatic to add them to the lineup.

Cronuts!!!!

Bloody Mary two ways

Piquant is soon to launch a dinner and full liquor menu. We were the very lucky group to get Tampa's first preview of Chef Jordan Hoeffner’s Bloody Mary Two Ways, which was hands down one of the best and most creative bloody mary's I've ever encountered. Chef infuses vodka with Thai Bird Chiles, uses a house bloody mary mix and rims the beauty with a balsamic reduction, Cajun seasoning and sriracha salt. It's spicy, but not too much for this weakling.  If this isn't enough, Chef uses molecular gastronomy with a celery stalk by jellifying bloody mary into it!! Leslie quickly instructed the table to stop what they were doing and eat the smoked and pickled cherry tomato. I'm not a tomato fan and I could have taken down a few plates of this awesomeness.  Let's just say, I am very excited for Piquant to launch their bar menu and Chef Hoeffner is a liquid genius.

That may have been the longest description I have ever written about a cocktail. Moving onto the food!

After seeing the brunch menu on Piquants Facebook page, we decided to sample the ENTIRE weekly selections.

Starting off with the day with a few appetizers, we dined on Sausis Feuilletes, an all beef, Natural sausage, rolled in puff pastry which could be the worlds best hangover reliever! This was served with red wine ketchup & chardonnay mustard. It was the one item on the menu I secretly wanted to try and was very happy we decided to split every item.

 

Our second starter of the day: Bouillabaisse, a classic seafood broth with poached grouper, bay scallops, shrimp & clams.

Moving onto the entrees, we learned to never judge an entrée by it's cover. While it may not be the most photogenic entrée, The French “Redneck” was by far my favorite dish of the day. A house made Croissant was topped with some of the most delicious sausage gravy I've ever had (shhh...don't tell Grandma). I grew up on homemade biscuits and gravy and The French Redneck got two thumbs up from this Southern Girl.

 

I am such an Eggs Benedict girl so I was very happy to see Black & Blue Benedict on the menu. This dish consisted of 2 poached eggs, roast tenderloin, caramelized onion, mushrooms and a hand-crafted thyme Scone, topped with blue cheese hollandaise.

A crowd favorite was the Crab “Oscar” Crepes, a take on the classic, bechamel, asparagus tips and lump crab topped with lemon hollandaise. All of us went back for second portions of this dish. We had the option to add an egg to make this dish  “Chelsea Style” but chose to keep it simple, which was delicious.

The final item we sampled from the weekly brunch menu was Duck and Waffles, Southern fried duck confit placed on a delicious pumpkin waffle. This incredible dish was served with a bourbon maple glaze, hot sauce and crispy sage leaves and it left me wanting more!

Finally, the Cronuts. As I mentioned above, The Croissant Donut made it's way to Tampa by way of Piquant this summer. I had my first one the week we got engaged. Funny how I tie a Cronut to my engagement. Since then, Piquant has made this very sought after pastry in multiple flavors - Nutella, Guava, Raspberry, Vanilla, Cinnamon Sugar and Plain. I am not a donut person but have a soft spot for Cronuts. I opted for Nutella and it was the perfect ending to a perfect brunch.

I was very impressed with the brunch at Piquant Hyde Park. The staff is very talented and friendly, making a great location for a nice meal out. Make sure you are fans of Piquants facebook page, so you can keep up with their weekly brunch specials!