The Red Wagon: Blueberry bottomed pancakes

The Red Wagon

2296 East Hastings, Vancouver

I first read about The Red Wagon on fellow blogger’s site, parkerpages. The little breakfast joint is located right on the corner of East Hastings and Garden Drive at a high traffic area, just walking distance from some residential blocks. And most importantly, The Red Wagon’s menu features my favourite breakfast food: pancakes!

A quick glance at the menu and I already knew that I was going to order the blueberry buttermilk pancakes with maple syrup and a side of breakfast sausage and scrambled eggs. The ultimate dream of a greasy spoon breakfast.

The pancakes here are medallion sized, mini and cute, and they do stack up quite nicely. The other great thing about the pancakes here are that what they lack in diameter, they make up for in thickness. I love thick pancakes. What I don’t love are tough and thick pancakes. And as cute as these little cakes were, I got the feeling that the batter was a tad over-mixed because there was a certain rubbery gumminess to the pancakes. Another thing I disliked was that all the sweet blueberries had sunk to the bottom of each cake. The sugar from the blueberries caramelized on the bottom of the pancake, creating some burnt spots.

There was nothing special about the breakfast sausage, the skin was a little bit tough but the inside of the sausage was salty and seasoned in the comforting style of your regular continental breakfast sausage.

The eggs were some of the fluffiest I’ve ever had in my life though, they were light, creamy and smooth but not runny.

It was endearing that the bill came on a plate with two colourful gummies. The food wasn’t the greatest but the service and decor was good. I especially like the cut-up pieces of a rusty Coca-cola sign displayed on the side wall. It was a resourcefully artistic touch.