Our 45th breakfast stop in Schuylkill county brought us to the famous Leiby’s Restaurant/Ice Cream House in Tamaqua. We had a full crew today with Bryan, Kevin, Matt, Mike and Tonto all making the trip to the Land of Running Water.
We arrived at Leiby’s around 8:40 a.m. They have a nice breakfast menu with plenty of options for any palate. Bryan ordered the “Dutch Benedict,” which consisted of homemade biscuits and pork scrapple topped with poached eggs and Hollandaise sauce with hash browns. Kevin ordered his mushroom, egg and cheese omelette with a side of hash browns. Matt decided to stay true to his ways and order his usual two-eggs (scrambled) with a sausage patty and homefries. Mike went with the Steak & Eggs meal which included a 4-ounce Sirloin steak cooked to order with two eggs and your choice of homefries or hash browns (he chose hash browns) and toast. Tonto ended up getting the Western omelette (three eggs with diced ham, mushrooms, peppers, onions, tomatoes and cheese). He also ordered a side of pork roll.
Establishment: 5/5 – Leiby’s is a very large and clean restaurant. The parking lot was huge. The interior includes multiple dining rooms with booths, tables and a diner counter.
Service: 2/5 – Our waitress was nice but hardly came back to refill our coffees. It took us 22-minutes to receive our food which isn’t too bad considering there were five of us and Mike ordered a steak. We deducted some points from this category because Matt, who ordered homefries, ended up receiving hash browns instead. The biggest deduction came when Kevin received his mushroom omelette and found there to be no mushrooms inside at all. We’ve included a picture of his mushroom-less omelette below. He did tell the waitress and she promptly brought him a side order of shrooms a few minutes later.
Appearance: 3/5 – Our food didn’t look bad. Bryan’s Dutch Benedict looked a little sloppy but everything else came out hot and appetizing.
Taste: 3/5 – It wasn’t bad. Mike thought his steak was a little tough, but good enough. The hash browns were freshly sliced potatoes with onions that were cooked pretty well. Matt thought his sausage patty was pretty good and Bryan enjoyed his meal. His scrapple was cooked well but didn’t stand out with all of the other flavors from the eggs and Hollandaise sauce. The toast could’ve been toasted a little more but Mike and Tonto both liked it. Matt thought his was too “rye”, whatever that means.
Price: 5/5 – $45 for all five of us which isn’t bad at all. Again, this includes the steak that Mike ordered.
Overall, Leiby’s breakfast was about average. It didn’t really stand out but was good enough for a decent breakfast. It probably would have been better if we went a little later and ordered ice cream for dessert. Even though we won’t be rushing back, Leiby’s does provide those in the Tamaqua area with another breakfast option.
Before we finish today’s review, we would like to take the time to recognize chef/writer Anthony Bourdain, who passed away yesterday. He was one of our inspirations for traveling and writing about our food experiences. Rest in Peace!
Have a breakfast spot for us to visit? Email us your comments or suggestions at schuylkillbreakfast@gmail.com. You can also follow us on Twitter: @SkookBreakfast.
Breakfast in the Skook 