Brunch in Brooklyn: Five Leaves

A few months ago, while killing time on a long flight, Jordan watched a show that profiled places where NYC chefs eat, when they’re off the clock and without obligation to be at their own restaurant.

Jordan came home from that trip, raving about the show and insisting that we had to check out a few of the profiled restaurants — one being Five Leaves in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. For outings like these, I need very little convincing.

We journeyed out to Greenpoint by train, and given that a ride from Harlem to Greenpoint is far from a regular part of our rhythm, we hoped that the food would make it all worthwhile.

Five Leaves is popular — particularly for brunch, which is what we came for. Even though we were there on a Friday at noon, we still had to wait 25 minutes for a table.

Waiting to be seated meant Jordan and I were on entertainment duty with Jameson. There was lots of tickling and exaggerated reactions to what we pretended were his stinky feet. And when he realized he had the potential to make some new friends, he went IN. I love these next photos so much, because they so accurately capture his extroverted personality.

“Hey ladies!”Jordan and I are fortunate that Jameson generally does really well when we eat out at restaurants. A lot of this probably has to do with the fact that we’ve been taking him out to places since he was less than one-week-old. People often ask how we get out to so many different places, and while there are times when we rely on babysitters to stay home with him after bedtime, there are lots of times when Jameson rolls with us. It’s great that we get out and he tries all kinds of foods along with us.

Having said all of that — do you see those sleepy eyes right there? When those make an appearance just before we sit down to a meal out somewhere, it never really bodes well for a “relaxed” dining experience.

We were seated at one of the outdoor tables, in between groups of international tourists and local hipsters. This first photo is me in a moment of calm… Ahhhh, we’ve arrived. Ahhhh, this is greenery behind me is so beautiful. Ahhhh, I’m a master at this brunch thing. 

This next photo is me snapped back to reality, reminded of my entertainment job, as Jameson was shouting and screeching up at me from his stroller. This might seem unusual, but the stroller is our best bet when the cool hipster restaurants doesn’t come furnished with high chairs, and Jameson can’t be trusted to sit in our laps without turning over every last thing on the table.

Perhaps the upside to Jameson making a ton of noise at this point was that the server seemed to bump our order to the top of the list, and our food arrived in rapid time (I imagined her in the kitchen shouting, “Get that baby out of here!”). We had ordered two of their signature dishes with the plan to split it all equally. The first was the Moroccan Scramble, which was a mix of merguez sausage, scrambled eggs w/ spiced chickpeas, crushed avocado and grilled sourdough.

Oh em gee, that thing was so delicious. Putting chickpeas in a scrambled egg situation is such a brilliant idea, and one I definitely plan to replicate at home.

The other dish we ordered was the Ricotta Pancakes, which came with honeycomb butter (who knew butter, an amazing thing in and of itself, could be so enhanced?!), banana, blueberries, strawberries and 100% pure maple syrup.

Do you see Jameson’s little fingers reaching as soon as it hit the table?! Ha! I’ve never had ricotta pancakes quite so good. And Jameson was a fan too.

With our stomachs full and our mission accomplished, we made our way back to the Bedford Avenue subway stop. We passed a massive movie crew on the way. And then we came across a dope mural and snapped a few shots. And it’s just one of those moments when you say, “We get to live here?” With all the action and food favored by chefs and people speaking in different languages and zipping trains and dope street art.

“Yeeeeaaaaahhhhh!”