Morsel vs Biscuit & Bean – The Battle of Seattle’s Best Biscuit Sandwich

Morsel vs Biscuit & Bean – The Battle of Seattle’s Best Biscuit Sandwich

Comments: This Seattle Food War is not as juicy as Paseo vs Un Bien or Ezell’s vs Heaven Sent, but they do have history. But before we get to that, a bit of our history with Morsel and Biscuit & Bean.  We’ve always known about Morsel. It was known for it’s breakfast biscuit sandwiches and always had a line out the door every weekend morning. They used to be located one block down from their current location in a cramped old spot on The Ave(University Ave). If you wanted to beat the line you have to get there right when it opens. I remember one time I was 10 minutes early before Morsel opened. Nobody was there in line yet, so I figured I’d go to Safeway across the street to grab something really quick. I came back at 5 minutes after Morsel opened and there was a line out the door! Within 15 minutes it went from an empty sidewalk to a line out the door. They do not take call in orders on the weekends.

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The History Behind Morsel and Biscuit & Bean  

Here’s the history of how these two places are related. Prior to 2013, the Morsel location on The Ave was a place called Nook, which as also revered for it’s biscuits. It was actually featured on an Anthony Bourdain show. It surprisingly closed down and that’s when Morsel was born and took over the space. In 2014, Morsel’s owner teamed with the owners of a coffee shop and opened up another branch in Ballard, which was called Morsel & Bean. In 2018, the owners went their separate ways and the owners of the coffee shop kept the space and changed the name to Biscuit & Bean while the owner of Morsel went back to concentrate on Morsel. We heard about Biscuit and Bean only this year and visited for the first time, not knowing the history. After trying Biscuit and Bean, we talked about how similar the biscuits were to Morsel’s and that’s when we did some research to discover the history of the two places. There are some subtle differences between the recipes and ingredients. And that’s what made us wonder. Which biscuit sandwich is better? Morsel or Biscuit & Bean?

Here’s the tale of the tape: 

• Distance from our house: Morsel(4754 University Way NE, Seattle, WA 98105): 1 mile vs Biscuit & Bean(5905 15th Ave NW, Seattle, WA 98107): 3.5 miles
  
• Coffee Served: Morsel: Velton’s vs Biscuit & Bean: Conduit
• Established: Morsel: 2014 vs Biscuit & Bean: 2018

The Order For this Morsel vs Biscuit & Bean tasting, we tried to compare apples to apples so we got the 2 sandwiches from each location on buttermilk biscuits. You actually have a choice of cheddar, buttermilk and a special(For ex. garlic/oregano/parm). We wanted to let the sandwich ingredients do the talking, so we chose buttermilk. Both locations were very close to the tasting location, so we were able to compare fresh servings side by side.

The Rating System: For this Morsel vs Biscuit & Bean tasting, we decided to rate the meal based on the below. We gave an increased weighting for Service(2x) and Taste(3x) since we feel these are more important.

1. Brick & Mortar- Morsel has just moved into a much bigger and brand new spot when compared to their old spot down the street. There is no dedicated parking. Biscuit & Bean is in a stand alone building and they do have dedicated parking as well as drive thru window. They also have a patio. It’s a bit smaller than Morsel, but it doesn’t feel cramped. Winner: Biscuit & Bean(1)

2. Service – Both have similar systems- you order, pay, sit down and wait until they call out your order when it’s ready. The day we went it was a Sunday morning, so both places were equally busy with about a constant 4 or 5 person line to order. All seats were taken in both places. Biscuit & Bean wins hands down. They were pleasant and quick. We ordered the two sandwiches and it took about 6 minutes. You can peek into the kitchen and they just seemed like a well oiled machine. Morsel took longer, about 15 minutes, which is fine. It’s not outrageous, but the service was an issue. For example I was giving my order to the cashier, I was half way through giving the order and one of the other workers interrupted the cashier to ask a question when we were clearly engaged.  Both the cashier and I were frustrated that we had to start all over with the order.  Also, both places are busy and noisy, so it’s hard to hear them call out the order from across the room. I went up to collect the order at Morsel and just wanted to confirm the name that was called. The guy just said, “yeah that’s what I said” and turned around. No “Thanks for coming” or “Have a good day”.  Truthfully, this is normally not a big deal, but I just felt some of the Morsel workers did not want to be there. This was easy to declare. Winner: Biscuit & Bean(2)

3. Value- The prices are very similar, but Morsel’s prices are a tad lower.  Winner: Morsel(1)

4. Taste-

• Biscuit – The Biscuit & Bean biscuits were a little bigger, which is not why they were better than Morsel’s.The biscuits were also fluffier and lighter where Morsel’s were denser. Taste-wise, they were about the same. Due to better consistency, Winner: Biscuit & Bean(1)

• The Fast Break(Morsel) vs The Classic(Biscuit & Bean)-These are basically the same sandwiches with different names. Both have bacon, scrambled eggs, tomato jam.  The main difference is that Biscuit & Bean uses Beecher’s Flagship White Cheddar and Morsel uses normal cheddar(orange). As you can see the ingredients are basically the same. The main difference can be seen in the picture above. The Morsel sandwich has a ton of egg. It’s actually thicker than the biscuit. Bigger is not always better. The egg just overpowered the other ingredients. Winner: Biscuit & Bean(1)

• The Spanish Fly(Morsel) vs The Signature(Biscuit & Bean) – Again basically the exact same sandwich which makes it great for comparisons. Both have prosciutto, fried egg, Mama Lil’s Pepper Aioli. The slight difference is that The Spanish Fly has spinach and smoked gouda. The Signature has arugula and manchego cheese. Although these ingredients are different, it’s still very similar. Both were good and not noticeably different. We’ll give the nod to Morsel due to the abundance of arugula, which made a slight difference. By the way, both eggs were cooked perfectly with yoke oozing.  Winner: Morsel(1)

5. Other- Morsel has three choices of sandwiches-the two that are mentioned above and a veggie version. Biscuit and Bean also has a veggie sandwich, but also has a Greek sandwich and one called, The Market, which has apple chicken sausage, spinach, mustard aioli and apple butter, which is my wife’s favorite. They also have a cool display of their biscuits so as a first timer, you can see how big they are. More options give’s Biscuit Bean the point. Winner: Biscuit & Bean(1)

The Final Tally

Summary:  So by a score of 6 to 2, Biscuit & Bean is the Winner!!! Most of our other Seattle Food Wars have been pretty close, but this was a blow out by Biscuit & Bean. Both of the biscuits held up well, the ingredients combinations were spot on and both are filling. The difference is really in the execution of both service and making of the biscuits/sandwiches.

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