Best hotel breakfast experience ever?
 

Upon check-out from the Royal Meridien Athenee I was asked to complete a survey about the hotel's breakfast buffet.

It was a very well constructed instrument, the last question the open ended: what was your best hotel breakfast experience, why?

I think that is a damn-fine question and present it now to the FT community.

Other noteworthy questions:

How important is having the breakfast included in your rate?

What are the five essential items a buffet must have?

Do you prefer buffet or ala-cart?

My answers, BTW:

Best experience: Crowne Plaza Wangfujing Beijing. Mix of buffet and made-to-order items crossing many countries from many regions, both East and West. (Admission, I rarely stay at truly exceptional hotels, so my experience is mostly limited to the business hotel buffets.)

Important, but not very important, to have breakfast included in rate.

Five items: Rice, Bacon, Fresh Fruit, Eggs and diverse tea selection.

Prefer mix, but if forced to choose, buffet over ala-cart.

experience - tie between >

- 5.5 hour long breakfast/lunch buffet with scallops, prime rib, lamb, etc for $28 @ Elk Mountain Resort, MTJ you could come and go as you pleased, so i had 2 meals in the great room by the fire, and then took smoked salmon and scallops back to my room's fridge for later ^ :)

- the traditional german (brought to table) + a la carte breakfast (continental station, cooked and other to order, several tasting style dishes which waitstaff circulated) @ Hotel Brandenburgerhof, TXL water was also included, whereas at all other times it was at cost. i did not have to pay anything for breakfast for 2.

hotel breakfast entree - best pancakes ive ever had were the souffle pancakes made by head chef at Elk Mountain Resort

best value - $40pp for 2 people for free at Sheraton Park Tower in London, because i was upgraded to Butler floor, on award stay, as Gold ^^ :D

best non hotel breakfast - on weekends, crabcakes benedict @ Artie's and Grand Caryle Cafe of the Great American Restaurants chain in Northern VA (best chain restaurant crabcakes ive ever had)

Best hotel breakfast: Full British at family friend's B&B in a small village in the Lake District of Northern England. Cooked with affection, so to speak. ;)

Importance of breakfast included: Important when on business trips in unfamiliar cities, doesn't matter when on leisure in familiar ones.

Essential items: Black/dark bread, cold fish cuts, egg, congee/porridge, fruits or veggies of some sort. I'll take what's on offer but this would be "comfort food" for me.

Preference: Ala carte over buffets

An oceanside table at the Rainbow Lanai breakfast buffet at the Hilton Hawaiian Village.

Best hotel breakfast: Hilton Hotel in Osaka Japan. Everything on the buffet was fresh and properly prepared. Was there for a week and there was enough variety to keep me interested.

Very best noodles! Perfectly prepared scrambled eggs and omlets to order. Why do Japanese eggs taste so good?

Excellent rice!

Fine hot tea and really nice coffee!

Pleasant atmosphere with attentive and polite staff. Pleasant and well lit breakfast room with big windows.

Did I mention the noodles?

Edited to add: this thread is fascinating! Thanks to the OP!

I'm like so not a breakfast person, but ...

Best: noodles at the Marina Mandarin in Singapore, best I ever
had, as well they might be at S$16 a la carte; did this only once,
as I could walk a block and get a greater variety, perhaps 90%
as good, for S$4 at the local food court.

Importance: I don't care if it's included in the rate - the rate
itself is more important to me.

Buffet essentials: this may sound strange, but broiled kidneys
and either lamb chops or bacon, for a Western breakfast.
Fresh fruit and noodles or egg tarts for an Eastern one.

Preference: a la carte if alone; buffet if with others.

For me, the IC in HKG had the best breakfast spread anywhere and the view across the water of the HK skyline made it a really incredible experience.

A juice bar (with something crazy like eight different fruit juices available to mix/match), western and eastern food stations, bakery selections (IIRC three different muffins each day, etc) and so on.

It was included in our rate (Virtuoso) but I would have done it anyways as it made the perfect start to a day of exploring the city.

The buffet at the BKK Peninsula was a close second.

Both of which took place on my honeymoon, so my memory might be skewed accordingly. :)

The best breakfasts I've ever had in my life have all been at Asian hotels.

I agree with the above posters about the Hilton Osaka and the Inter-Continental Hong Kong. Both had excellent buffet breakfasts. At the IC HKG, the buffet was served in the space that is now Spoon. We had a great view of the Harbour.

The breakfast buffet in the Regency Club at the GH HKG was very good. Selection was somewhat limited as is common with breakfasts in club lounges. But there was Balik salmon on the buffet! Complimentary Champagne served on Sunday mornings!

In Bangkok, Peninsula wins with selection and quality, but I didn't find the servers all that friendly. I love sitting on the riverfront having breakfast at the Oriental. The Four Seasons was a madhouse when I was there. It was so crowded. They were clearly understaffed and service regrettably slipped. Their bacon however was just the way I liked which was extra crispy and it was fantastic paired with the Four Seasons trademark lemon ricotta pancakes.

The breakfast buffet at the Four Seasons Singapore was disappointing. There wasn't even smoked salmon on the buffet and selection was rather limited. I enjoyed the buffet at the Conrad much more. It's a zoo at the Ritz-Carlton in the mornings.

I recently had the breakfast buffet at the Hilton Kuala Lumpur. It was very impressive in terms of selection. There was Indian, Japanese, Chinese, and Western dishes.

I really enjoyed the buffet at the Legian in Bali. The made to order chocolate chip pancakes were sublime.

42 the Calls, Leeds, UK. The full English is magnificent.


http://www.42thecalls.co.uk/intro2.html

I spent a few nights at a little B & B in Ireland about ten years ago called Bansha House. The food was superb and I discovered tasty things that i thought would be disgusting, such as stewed prunes (who knew?)

For a great overall breakfast experience, I'd have to say brunch on the outside patio at the Polo Lounge. Classic Beverly Hills Hotel style. Great atmosphere. Surprisingly good value for the price. And the occasional celeb sighting to excite out-of-town guests.

The swissHotel in Zurich. Smoked salmon, champer's everything youd'e possibly imagine. I am not a breakfast person either but still dream about it and it was free to top it off.^

One of the best hotel breakfasts I've had was ordering a la carte at the Hilton YVR restaurant (Carmicheals?). As good as any breakfast/brunch place and My partner and I would rate it one of the best ever. The property provides elites with a breakfast buffet coupon that was once applicable towards a la carte but sadly no longer.

The Sheraton Hotel in downtown Stockholm has an incredible spread--and the food is great!

Ah well... one of those questions it's almost impossible to give a single answer to.

Two recent favourites...

- The Metropolitan, Bangkok - breakfast at the Glow cafe; very quiet, with an a la carte menu and great service. Perfect coffee, and an intriguing mango-smoothie-thing.

- Amanjiwo, Java - breakfast in the restaurant early in the morning (I was the only person there), watching the sun rise over Borobodur. The best pancakes ever.

I suppose the ambience of the place (the quieter the better) is a big factor for me, in terms of 'best experience'. I don't tend to have more than a coffee and some croissants and some curious fruit for breakfast, so am not really as won over as hotels obviously hope one will be by those vast buffets...

Not sure this counts but...
 

Once had chesse cake at 4 am in Toronto's Royal York (room service). We'd just got back from a night out so i dont know if it counts as breakfast. But it was bloody good chesse cake.