As we walked towards Curiosity, it occurred to us that we may have made a big mistake. As snow settled in small piles on top of waiting children, we thought that going for brunch on Bloor in the middle of the Santa Claus Parade may not have been the best idea. Nonetheless, we had made plans to meet Marco, and we weren’t going to change them now.

And I have to say, Curiosity has a great atmosphere for walking into out of the snow. Cozy, warm and woody, like a rich uncle’s den except with style. Ancient pawn shop instruments hang on the wall. I really wanted to try the banjo.

But you’re here to hear about the food, aren’t you? Well, first off, Marco had a full bodum of good coffee waiting for us, which was a sign of good things to come. I ordered the Eggs Hudson, a variation on the Benny which uses a fantastic herbed oil instead of hollandaise and comes with prosciutto and arugula, which actually works better than I would have thought. Meaning, I thought it would be pretty good, but it turned out to be excellent. Plop on a couple of perfectly poached eggs and you have a wonderful creation.

Marco got an order of the regular Benny with hollandaise, which by all reports was also great. I could tell just by looking that it was a well-made hollandaise; thick and clingy. Kim got a regular scrambled egg thing, I think.

All the breakfasts came with rösti that was good, but not great. It could use some more spicing and was kind of oily (I know, I know; you can’t make it not oily…); mine was also kind of undercooked, though the other two were fine. The other thing I would quibble with, and this is just a personal preference, is that I like to get just a little bit of greenery with brunch; tossing a few mixed greens on a plate would go a long way.

They do get points for the quality of the breakfast sausages, however. This is an element too often ignored by other brunch spots, however Curiosity’s sausages are larger than most, plump, satisfyingly spicy, and not overcooked.

At any rate, it’s obvious that someone (everyone, actually) at Curiosity really knows what they’re doing. I’d love to go there sometime for dinner, but for now: man, what a kick-ass brunch spot.