brunching at bottega louie

I've been to the fabulous Bottega Louie in Downtown LA twice for dinner, drinks and dessert, but have always wanted to try their breakfast menu. So when my friend Diana asked to take me to brunch to kick off my birthday week, and mentioned going somewhere special (aka somewhere other than Hugo's or 4n20), I picked Bottega, and I'm so glad I did (even though I've been in a food coma all day). 

Here's the deliciousness we devoured:

I started with a chai tea latte (shocker!) and fresh squeezed orange juice. The chai was small and just sweet enough. The juice was thick and pulpy and good. Diana had fresh pinapple juice. 

We ordered raspberry beignets as a "starter." These are not like the beignets I've had before from the world-famous Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans (which actually did not live up to their hype). These are covered with normal sugar, not messy powdered sugar, and were lighter..just like a sugared doughnut. The raspberry compote was great!

Diana had the Breakfast Flatbread for her entree, which consisted of Bottega's pizza dough (fresh out of their giant pizza oven) covered in prosciutto, mozzarella, baked egg, arugula and a house arrabiata sauce she said was really good.

I had a really hard time deciding what to order for my entree. I almost got the french toast, but decided that'd be bread overload after the beignets. So I ordered the spinach and goat cheese quiche, served with a side of frisee salad and pear tomatoes. It was pretty great. My one recommendation would be to add another layer of spinach lower in the quiche. It was all up on the top layer, which was crispy. 

After all that (plus the yummy Bottega bread they bring for breakfast too, but with jam!), we were stuffed. However, I'd already decided I was stopping at the patisserie on the way out for Sunday night dessert with the 'rents. Here's what I took to-go:

A giant piece of tiramasu, that made my mom decide she wants to start making tiramasu. This isn't my fave dessert, but the bite I had was pretty good.



Creme brule -- this IS my fave dessert! And Bottega Louie has three flavors. I ate the normal vanilla one, surrounded by raspberries, with some green garnish that I never figured out sprinkled all around, and sitting on a crisp, sweet base.

Dad got the chocolate creme brule. He didn't share so I don't know what it tasted like, but I assume it was good since he devoured it pretty quickly. The third flavor they have is hazelnut, which I'm not a huge fan of, but I'm sure it's good to people who like hazelnut.