Breakfast Club of Menifee

From our "Ask and You Shall Receive" department, comes the following information about a frequently asked-about restaurant going into the new Countryside Marketplace.

Breakfast Club of Menifee is like what the name suggests, a place to have breakfast. But while the name also includes the word, "club", it's open to anyone who wants to come in and enjoy a really good breakfast.

After getting so many questions from people wanting to know more about this establishment, I did some poking around and finally got hold of the owners.


Stu and Tracy are Menifee residents, having moved here in 2001 coming up from San Diego. Stu spent 40 years in the restaurant industry, mostly with large corporate players. "It's all about the bottom line in the corporate world", Stu says. "There's almost no room for creativity, and little time for good quality service".

From that spawned the idea to just focus on one restaurant, offer some creative new ideas, and provide the best service.

Stu left his corporate restaurant career to pursue this new venture, and this location in Menifee is all that there is. Some of you might have a done a Google search for "Breakfast Club", and saw many other establishments with the same name, but this one in Menifee is not associated with any other.

The concept is a full-service "sit down" style restaurant that serves all the familiar breakfast fixings, but with some twists. You'll get the omelettes, but you'll also see a ceviche omelette. They'll offer hot tea, but you'll get 16 different varieties. If you want fruit you won't be limited to just grapefruit, you'll get that plus mangoes, peaches, plums, grapes, and acai berries.

Sure they'll have pancakes galore, but they'll have "baked pancakes". It uses a special kind of batter that they put inside an oven and it rises high (Stu used his hands to suggest something like 6 inches high), it eventually cools and shrinks back down. But the baking allows the ingredients to mix its flavors into each other more completely. "Banana Foster" and "Cinnamon Apple" were a couple of varieties he threw at me.

If you just want a hearty steak and eggs, they'll be serving up steakhouse quality beef. He used the word "Outback Steakhouse" to describe the quality, but without the Outback Steakhouse prices.

He also mentioned Tracy's very own "Breakfast Club Potatoes".

They'll have fresh squeezed orange juice, and a variety of other juices each morning. They'll be making fresh salsa and guacamole every morning. And while you're waiting for your meal to come out, you'll get to enjoy freshly baked biscuits.

If you're one of those types who'd rather just sit up at the bar, they'll have one of those too, but it'll be a cappuccino bar. And all the tables will be covered in cloth.

And if the first meal of the day isn't all that's important, they'll have televisions running the morning news programs.

The "Club" in Breakfast Club is an optional membership, which for about $25.00 per year you'll get all the coffee you want at no additional cost. They'll give you a personalized mug with your name on it, and it'll hang in the dining room. When you walk in, just grab your mug, sit it on the table or bar, and get your fill. My wife wondered if hot tea was included, but I didn't ask.

The club membership also gets you on a mailing list for members-only specials and discounts.

If you don't have the time to dine in, all orders are available to go as well. And for those folks who need an omelette to go, they can put it in a wrapped form making it easier to eat.

It'll be open every morning starting at 5:30am and closes at 1:00pm. After hours the restaurant will be available to private parties, meetings, clubs, banquets, etc.

Both Stu and Tracy moved into Menifee to get away from the congestion of the big city, and fell in love with the small town feel. When they found out about Countryside Marketplace being built, they wanted to get in on it. If you recall when Donahue Schriber came to Sun City to speak about the new shopping center, they said they were looking for some kind of local business that offered something unique (see previous article). This is it. When Stu and Tracy presented their idea, Donahue Schriber jumped on it and have been helping the pair move as quickly as they can.

As it is now, Breakfast Club of Menifee will have Tracy doing the day to day management while their college sons, plus a littler one, will be helping out. Stu talked about future expansion plans possibly placing more locations throughout Southern California.

If all goes well inside City Hall, they're looking at this April to open their doors. And for their opening day, they're thinking of doing something similar to Red Robin, where they do an invitation only for a day or two to give their staffers some practice before the grand opening.

Note to City Hall: fast track this thing will ya?