Sunnyside Up Cafe

R.I.P The Sunnyside Up Café.
I walked by today and saw that the windows were broken and boarded up, the tables were gone, and the door had been vandalized. It makes want to investigate the exact reason why it no longer is in business. Did the owner have a run in with the mob? Health code violation?
Whatever the reason, the fact that the Sunnyside Up Café is closed makes me sad, sad, sad. This was my go-​to breakfast place. I have taken many friends and dates here to have their generously portioned hashbrowns well-​done. The blue corn pancakes, the cornflake french toast, the biscuits and gravy… all of it a sweet bygone memory.
Then I realized that when I was there last was one of the last days of the Café. They were having a hard time, as one of the line cooks had quit so we had to wait a bit for our food. If only I knew that my drowsy mornings at the Sunnyside Up would be numbered. =(

Good food, horrible service.
I guess it’s good that I had some time to kill on a Sunday brunch, but we waited 10 minutes for our server to bring water and another 40 minutes for food to come. That’s on top of waiting 20 minutes outside for the table.
Food is decent, good brunch items. Biscuits and gravy, French toast, eggs, most everything won’t disappoint.
It’s pretty dirty inside. Servers spill maple syrup everywhere, silverware not the cleanest, tables are sticky.
All in all, it’s okay for a $ 9 breakfast.

Full disclosure: Sunnyside Up Café is «our place» for me and my boyfriend. We love breakfast and it’s a couple of blocks from his place, so there ya go!
This place is a dive, and the service could be better. Okay, a lot better. Infinitely better. But the neighborhoody feel and the good food for decent prices make the trip to Sunnyside absolutely worth the long wait for a table or acknowledgement of your presence at the table. It’s a breakfast place, what do you expect?
The biscuits and gravy are gooey and heavy and just perfect in every way. We have to stop ourselves from getting it every time we go so we can try something new. The early bird specials are an amazing price during the weekday, but I’m not an early bird so have never made it. The Sanfa Fe railroad breakfast is also good. Yikes, I’m getting hungry!
Coffee cups are bottomless and do not go neglected, so the waitresses do that right, and the portions are ginormous.

Dirty (dust covered flouresent ceiling bulbs, stained and sticky wall to wall carpet… you get the idea). Yes, it was winter in Minnesota, but the dining space was so cold that I ate my luke warm breakfast with my coat on. Blerg.
I will say, our server was cheerful, patient and helpful. Maybe a fun place to eat outside in the summer?

Despite its name, Sunny Side Up should not be sought after for its American Style breakfast fares. Actually, despite its name, you shouldn’t go here for great breakfast.
Sunny Side Up is frankly, a textbook take on a diner. Good food (not great) fun take on French Toast (Albeit not to tasty) and the ambience is pretty average (Plastic Table clothes)
I had the classic 2 eggs, hashbrowns, and toast, and it lived up to expectations, but thats about it. The eggs benedict: Alright, but nothing great.
This place would be fantastic if you live next door and could regular this place, but dont drive a mile to get here. No offense meant, but this place is just… so… adequate. And in a place like Minneapolis, adequate doesn’t fly.

This is the best breakfast place anywhere near the Uptown area. The décor is unique. Humorous western murals decorate the walls, while odd objects du art are scattered here and there.
The food is good to excellent, including some creative offerings on the whiteboard in back, especially the Benny, which lets the cooks express their wilder side with various takes on the eggs Benedict theme.
Otherwise the menu offers a good blend of egg combos, pancake combos and such, as well as some comfort food, some decent (but not great) Mexican stuff, and a few sandwiches. I’ve tried most of it over the years, and I’ve never had a bad meal.
The atmosphere is comfortably Bohemian, but they keep the place clean, so don’t worry about getting sick. The wait staff are friendly and efficient, and they bring your morning coffee quickly. The dining room is spacious, with at least 30 tables of various sizes. On weekends it often close to full, but you can get a table anytime during the week.
There are a few places that serve better breakfasts in Minneapolis, but they are downtown or in the suburbs, and usually they are at least a few bucks more expensive. Overall I give the Sunnyside Up a solid four stars.

The table plastic covers in this place literally made me gag!.. Not just because they look like they have been in the same place for the past 40 years. They definitely have seen their better days. But. I am sitting at my table and every time I cross my legs or move, they brush up against my legs. It’s horrible, sticky and It smells like someones old balls decided to be a plastic table cover!!! omg!
Other than that. the food is yummmmmay.
The poached eggs, with the meatball sausage breakfast is soooo delicious, it made me forget about the plastic covers (a little).

Best breakfast place in Uptown. This isn’t a debate but a statement.
Cash only so no credit cards please
Come hungry. The omelettes are four egg omelettes and trust me you won’t eat for most of the rest of the day.
Huevos is excellent as well as the free fruit.
Be prepared on the weekends, for there will be lines.

The french toast is pretty damn good. The cornflake/​cinnamon coating is unique and delicious. That’s pretty much all I ever get there, so I can’t tell you whether or not anything else is good. You’ll have to check out some other reviews for information on other food items.
I would give 5 stars, but the last time I was there it took FOREVER for the food to come and I had to hunt down my own silverware. I guess if you like waiting around for your food and a good old fashioned scavenger hunt, this would be a plus. But on a Sunday morning I am usually not in the mood to do much searching.
Also, bring cash. No credit cards accepted.

I used to frequent Sunnyside Up a few years ago for all the wrong reasons: the chorizo and the waiter for whom I carried a torch. Then I became vegetarian and he quit working there, so it had been awhile. I went back last Saturday and was very pleased. This time I had the veggie plate with scrambled eggs and hash browns and was super satisfied. Only complaint was that it was too much food! I also love their blue corn pancakes and french toast, and they have good hot sauce on the table (not just your average tobasco bottle). And you can get rye toast. It’s the small things…
The vibe is different on a weekend (I used to go in almost exclusively on weekdays) but it was still high energy and happy. I love dining out and feeling like my server genuinely cares that I am enjoying it. I’ve always had that feeling here.

Escape the Burbs for a Breakfast adventure! This is what I look for in a greasy spoon (meant in a positive way) diner.
This is the type of place you walk through the door, see all the full tables and just know that you are going to have a good breakfast experience. I had heard about the French Toast but this was meant to be a Biscuits and Gravy type morning.
I was a little disappointed when the food came to the table. The service was great, food came fast and everything was good so far but the biscuits were small and the biscuit tops were sitting on the top of the eggs? OK, not to panic, taste it first. Glad I hung in there because everything turned out fine. The Biscuits were very good, small but nice and fluffy and stayed firm even with the gravy on them. Gravy was good, not to spicy but they had hot sauce and the potatoes were great. Overall a hit!
I have a couple of breakfast places around this area that I would make the first stop but this was well worth the drive. I look forward to going back and trying the French Toast, that is if I’m not having a B&G type of morning yet again.
KT

I am a huge fan of this place. The food is always cooked the way I want it (aka if I want over MEDIUM eggs, they come out that way), my coffee and water are always full, and the portions of food are huge. My daughter and I can split a meal there, and we are both huge eaters.
I would agree with the others that reviewed this place that sometimes the service isn’t the greatest, but the yummy heaping portions of food totally make up for it for me. I definitely recommend this place to people. And yes, remember your CASH because they don’t take credit cards! :)

I have been by this place so many times. I have never really known what to make of it. Looks a little divey. Crazy painted murals. There usually seem to be good crowds though, so I mentally bookmarked it. My friend is in town for a visit and really wanted French toast. I came onto Unilocal and saw the good reviews, so we decided to give it a go. We got there before 9:30, so we walked right in. By 10:30, there was a little wait, but only one or two groups. Not bad.
We were greeted very nicely at the door and our server was friendly, helpful, attentive and completely on top of it. Our coffee and water were never empty. Our plates were cleared quickly. Our check was brought before we finished with a «when you’re ready» to let us know that we could still linger a little longer.
Food: We split the benny special with roasted tomatoes, spinach and ham. Yum! You were all right about the hash browns. Delicious and a great combination of crispy and tender. We also split the French toast. The flavor and crunchy outside bits were great. A little bit dry for me, but that didn’t outweigh the positives. We didn’t love the coffee. It was just a bit bitter. Not horrible, but not great. The prices were really reasonable for the portions and quality. We were a little shocked that we were both so stuffed and had spent less than $ 18 (before tip).
The atmosphere had a good neighborhood gathering spot feel to it. Lots of families and obvious locals. The colorful southwestern murals were simultaneously cheerful and bizarre. I had a view of the fun coyote frying an egg for a tortoise. My friend had a view of a hawk grabbing a lizard for a snack. It just didn’t gel with the gritty grandma’s diner sort of vibe in the rest of the place.
So, I guess my summary is: don’t go for the ambiance or coffee, but do go for the food and neighborhood feel.

From out of town, and new to this restaurant, I guess I should have read some of the other Unilocal reviews of this place. I quickly just looked at the average rating of four stars. Base on the food alone, I guess I could see three stars. But, the food and atmosphere would have to be extremely excellent to appropriately make up for the unacceptable service.
The food was simply average, and the actual restaurant was pretty ugly with the lazy painting on the walls. It has crudely thrown-​together nursery-​type characters and color themes painted all around with ill-​applied yellow. Nothing seemed too clean either.
The service was slow, and when I ordered an omelette, I asked for no onions in it. The server informed me she couldn’t do that. She said it in such a way, that I thought it was some friendly jesting, in the manner of «Of course we can do that silly!». But no, she said that the cook would not do that, and that is «just how it is here».
Now I’ve read some reviews here that specify some dishes which are said to be delicious, and I guess, I hope those dishes are phenomenal enough to warrant this diva behavior by the cook. My omelette and my wife’s eggs benedict were simply average, and I wasn’t blown away enough to patronize a place that can’t accommodate such a simple request. Ashley Y.‘s review kind of fills out the story as well…

Note: I tend to rate a place on the food rather than the service…
4 Stars for the food — French toast was very different and tasty, the hash browns are GREAT, could have just ordered a plate of the ‘browns and been perfectly happy. Hubby listened to our fellow Unilocalers and ordered the biscuits and gravy. Yet again the Unilocal community came through, the dish was awesome. Cost was what breakfast should cost, less than $ 10 a person.
2 stars for service — Short staffed? rude just because? Venting anger from the cook yelling at her (which we could hear from the other side of the restaurant)? Our waitress was short with us and took much longer than normal to take our orders and to bring the check, might have been excusable if the place wasn’t half empty.
Overall — we’ll be back, for the food.

One thing I love about Mpls is the fact that there is no shortage of breakfast joints. This place does a great job with the casual greasy food — then she’ll surprise you with great crab-​cake benedict.
My reco is to go with whatever the special is.

I’ll just add my «two forks up» to the other comments posted here. Come early enough on a Saturday morning (say 7:30am) and you won’t have to wait a single minute for your tasty breakfast.
The wait staff is great – a perfect combination of personality and laid-​back service. Tables are topped with retro checkered cloths laminated in easy-​to-​clean vinyl. Anything you need is right at your fingertips, and if not, it’ll be there in a blink once you ask.
I have to comment on the hash browns. I mentioned to our waitress once that I didn’t think I got enough hash browns with my breakfast, and she literally stopped in her tracks and asked me if I was kidding. Of course I was! If you like hash browns, this is your nirvana. Order any meal with hash browns, and expect the *entire plate* to be covered with the crispy treasures and the rest of your breakfast piled on top. (And don’t be surprised if there’s a small side of hash browns added there, too.) Bön apetite!

So I’m impulse blogging. but this is one of my favorite places in Minneapolis. Plus, this morning I discovered that free internet can be obtained here, thus my ability to impulse Unilocal!
The food here has been consistently great for YEARS. I love the atmosphere and the staff are great as well. It’s in the heart of what I love about this area even though I live hundreds of miles away now.
In summary: COME EAT FOOD HERE, you won’t be disappointed or hungry afterwards. If you are, you didn’t eat anything.

Well… another
success story. Today was one of my good friend’s birthdays, and after debating what we should do to celebrate, I turned to Unilocal (why didn’t I just come here first?)
We decided to walk over to Sunnyside Up Café on Lyndale. When we approached at about 10a, there was the standard Sunday morning breakfast line. After a moment of confusion about who was in line or not, we added our name to the list. «It’ll be about an hour on food» we all were told — to which the 8 or so people in front of us decided to try their luck elsewhere. With just the two of us left, we were seated, however, told that it would still be an hour wait due to the fact that one of the cooks didn’t show for work this morning! We decided to wait it out (and I’m so glad we did).
My friend ordered coffee (and for a coffee snob, he was impressed with it). I ordered some chocolate milk. In the hour we sat and conversed, I don’t think his coffee got past mid-​cup the entire time — it was like his cup had some sort of sensor built in! ;) As for my chocolate milk, with the wait, the server brought me another big glass once the food finally arrived (how sweet).
The food: Ohmygoodness! I ordered the Cowboy Tort, which was «Pork green chili layered between corn tortillas and melted cheese, served with eggs, refried beans, sour cream and ranchero salsa» — my friend ordered the standard Biscuits and Gravy. We also ordered a shortstack so that we could both try their pancakes too.
The food was simply amazing. To make things even better, our server brought out the shortstack with a lit candle and sang happy birthday to my friend! The breakfasts were super flavorful. My friend’s hashbrowns were perfect, the biscuits and gravy were super flavorful and the sausage chunks were wonderful. My tort was one big cheesy, gooey, Mexi-​wonderfulness! It was served with eggs, salsa, beans and sour cream. I would highly highly recommend, but be prepared for a takeout box with the sheer amount of food! The shortstack was the only disappointment in our meal; the pancakes were dry — a good flavor, but the texture just didn’t work. I think the issue was that they were cooked too long and as a result were crispy, not light and airy. As you can tell by my rating, this had little impact on the enjoyment of the rest of our food!
The restaurant itself: I was a bit surprised with how much seating there was. A lot of tables, a lot of room and a lot of people moving about. The walls were painted with murals — and we happened to be very pleased with where we sat: A hawk with a birthday hat on flying after a toad with a big bow — how appropriate for the birthday boy! :)
Final verdict? I highly recommend this place. The food was great and the service was fantastic, thus making the overall experience a good one. If Bethany is working, she’ll be sure to take care of you and keep your beverages filled. I think I earned some serious points for picking this place as the birthday breakfast spot! Happy Birthday E! *grin*
PS — Quick heads-​up: this place doesn’t take plastic, so be sure to bring cash! For those of us that don’t carry cash, they do have an ATM inside. Just remember this little piece of info when you head out for that wonderful breakfast you’re about to have!

Why go to Perkins or Baker’s Square when you can support locally?
The food was so much better than anything that can be found at a chain restaurant. Prices were low and everything was fresh. The orange juice tasted like real oranges, because they squeezed it THAT morning.
You will be blown away by their wide variety of breakfast goods. You get so much food for your money and the service was perfect.
Be sure to check out the specials of the day for even more delicious savings.