Brunch Review: F.W. Sullivans

I have a hit list of places I want to brunch at in Richmond, and F.W. Sullivan's has been one since following them on Instagram. Not only do they appear to have a variety of types of meals, ranging from steak to burgers to pasta dishes and flatbreads, but they deliver (except not for brunch, which I think would be beyond clever). I used that delivery option once for dinner, and felt a bit bad about it, as it was one of the coldest days of the year and the poor bastard biked our food to us. Anyways, not the point of this post. Back to brunch.

In all honesty, we were trying to go to Sidewalk, but then it was unreasonably busy, so we went to Sully's. It was perfectly not swamped, and we got right to a table. Before ordering, a waitress brought us a mimosa that we didn't order, then realized we were new here. She then came back to take our drink order -- just coffee and water (too tired/hungover for some mimosas, who knew that was possible).

Then she didn't really come back for awhile. Another waitress had to come by to ask us our drink order, which was still just water and coffee. Then the other waitress came with just my coffee. Somewhat helpful, but my dehydration really could use some water. Eventually the two waitress communicated, and we got our water. After that confusion, we put in our food order. I got the Monte Cristo, as it seemed like a very weird mix of salty and sweet, so naturally I needed that in my life. My roommate ordered the bagel and lox (if you can't tell, I only keep around friends who love bagel and lox). We also got an appetizer of the Bangkok shrimp because we were a little on the ravished side. Also, look how freaking good they looked on Instgram.

What we get doesn't look at all like that picture of shrimp they Instagramed. They weren't orange like they were in the picture, but a muted off white color. I wasn’t impressed by the presentation. Also, for $9, I was really hoping for more shrimps, or at least some tots, fries or even a bed of lettuce they could lay on. Despite the presentation not being up to the Instagrammed standard, they tasted delicious. The sauce was on point, and the shrimps were good and tender.

Once we ate those, we waited a bit more and our food made it out.

I almost DIED when I saw the portion size. It was an enormous stacked sandwich that I knew I wouldn't be able to finish in one sitting. One facet of the meal I didn't quite love (well, both meals on the table to be honest) was the amount of self-service. I understand why they do it that way (so that I could pick my own jelly flavor) but it was annoying having to deconstruct my triangles to smother in jelly, then rebuilt and dip in syrup. It was a lengthy process that would have been expedited if they just asked what kind of jelly I wanted beforehand and then put on for me. I'm a princess, I get it.

The pictures I took of both meals make the food look washed out and all. I was going to throw it into Insta to get some good filters going on both, but then I'd be going the way of the shrimpies, and I don't want to mislead y'all. That's really how it looks. The colors are bland, BUT the taste is killer. All around, I enjoyed it. The french toast breading wasn't too sweet, so it tasted much more sandwich-y than I expected. The jelly also took it up a notch and added quite a bit of flavor to the meal. I went with strawberry, and would recommend that.

My roommate's plate was pretty, but even the salmon looked sort of a bland orange color, which is odd. However, it tasted great. I'm starting to wonder if everything looked pale because of poor lighting? Maybe? Who cares, the food tastes good and I'd come back in a heartbeat for that food.