Brother Joe
Brother Joe – Georgetown
Recommended by: Nobody. We mentioned our tradition of stopping by in Georgetown whenever we have a trip out of the Seatac Airport in our Square Knot Diner post. We thought we’d try Brother Joe down the street as a change of pace.
Description on Lighthouse Roaster’s website : One of Seattle’s original roaster cafes, Lighthouse has spent more than twenty years creating a loyal following of coffee lovers by treating the coffee buying, roasting and drink-making as a noble call
Description on Brother Joe’s website : What we do. Truly Great Coffee and Teas, Weekday Breakfast and Lunch, Weekend Brunch.
Address:5629 Airport Way S, Seattle, WA 98108
What we ate/drank: CHILE VERDE Hatch chile and tomato braised pork over cornbread with a fried egg, cotija cheese, crema, and cilantro. $13, KALUA PORK ‘LOCO MOCO’ Braised pork with bacon, jasmine rice, miso slaw, sunny side up egg, and aloha gravy. Herkimer – Oh Miso Coffee, Mocha
Comments: We mentioned our tradition of stopping by in Georgetown whenever we have a trip out of the Seatac Airport in our Square Knot Diner post. This time around we made a detour to another Georgetown establishment. We went to Brother Joe for the first time, which is right down the street. Upon entering it appears to be a coffee-centric café with its huge visual infographic coffee menu(We’ll get back to this a little later), but they actually have a kitchen and have a pretty big selection of breakfast dishes, sandwiches, wraps and salads.
You order your drinks and food at the counter, take a seat and they’ll bring it out to you. The counter area has an old weathered vintage – vintage fridge, weathered wall, exposed bricks. There’s a pretty big dining area that serves close to maybe 30+ people. This area has a rhino theme with huge gold rhino trophy head, rhino painting and book ends. The rest of the wall space is filled with different animal portraits dressed in human clothes. Our two year old daughter was both amused and confused to see a cat in a cowboy outfit.
We ended up sitting in their little “living room” section, which basically looks like a mid century modern sitting area with a leather couch, coffee table, shelves, a floor lamp, seating nooks in the window and a couple of chairs. My understanding that this is normally used as a waiting area on the weekends when it gets crowded, but we ended up going on a Friday morning, so they told us it was fine sitting there.
The coffee used here is Herkimer Coffee and as mentioned above there’s a huge visual menu of their coffee drinks, which is definitely needed due to some of the one of a kind specialty drinks, such as:
- You Know Chata? -Cold brew with rice, vanilla and cinnamon
- Black Rhino – Espresso affogato with a cardamom and chocolate fudge ice cream
- Holy Mole Mocha – Espresso with Mexican chocolate, chiles, orange zest
- Oh, Miso Honey – Espresso with orange blossom honey-miso caramel
- Off-White Velour – Espresso with salted caramel, white chocolate
- Egg Coffee – Drip coffee with egg yolk and condensed milk
My wife got a regular mocha, but I tried the Oh, Miso Honey. To be honest, I was expecting a little more flavor, but it was fine. We also ordered food and this is where we were pleasantly surprised.
Unfairly, we had low expectations since our mindset was a coffee shop that happens to serve food as an afterthought, but the meals stand on their own. All sauces and syrups are made in house. We had the Chile Verde and the Kalua Pork Loco Moco. As mentioned in our Watson’s Counter post, we’ve had a lot of Loco Mocos in Seattle and although not as good as Watson’s Counter’s, it was just a small notch below, but still very delicious. Brother Joe’s take on the dish uses braised pork instead of a beef patty, but we really liked their variation it. The addition of the miso slaw and bacon along with the standard Loco Moco ingredients of a sunny side up egg, rice and gravy gives it a one of a kind twist.
KALUA PORK ‘LOCO MOCO’ Braised pork with bacon, jasmine rice, miso slaw, sunny side up egg, and aloha gravy. Score: (4.75/ 5.0)
The Chile Verde was a closer to a traditional dish, but delicious none the less. The menu says the pork is over cornbread, but ours came with fried potatoes, which to be honest we prefer. To have tortilla and cornbread seems a bit redundant. Glad they gave us potatoes instead.
Square Knot Diner has been our defacto Georgetown breakfast destination ever since Carmela at Roxy’s Diner suggested it, but after visiting Brother Joe, it’s given us options now. We will for sure be back after our enjoyable experience here.
Ratings:
Atmosphere: 5.00
Service: 4.75
Food/Drinks: 4.75
Bang for the Buck: 4.50
Overall: 4.75
Locals Only Factor: “Locals Only” grading-We’ll assign a grading as to how “local” a place is.
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- Well known or Touristy. Most locals don’t go there unless they have business dinners or visitors in town.
- Most locals know about it
- Locals “in the know” know about it
- Only those who live close by know about it.
- You’re in on the secret. Don’t tell anybody!
Servers recommendations to visit in the future: We met a young lady outside who had a dog. She was waiting for her coffee to be made. Our daughter wanted to see her dog. We told her it was our first time at Brother Joe and if she could recommend any of her other favorite places to eat. She suggested The Hangar Café a few blocks away.
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