Royal Stone + the Spruce St Suspension Bridge in Banker’s Hill

I got the breakfast bug again recently and picked a new spot for Jake and I to try. I picked a spot in Banker’s Hill called Royal Stone. Their toast looked amazing on Yelp (yes, toast can look amazing, I promise) and it had dog friendly seating. Winner winner!

Royal Stone is nestled into the heart of Banker’s Hill – it’s pretty much in the neighborhood in kind of a hidden little spot. I don’t think you’d randomly find this place just driving around unless you were looking at houses or something.

They have Stumptown coffee here!

Pastries!

There were quite a few seats available inside and out on a Saturday morning. It felt like a nice, quiet little spot to relax and have a little breakfast.

We sat at the end under a nice, big, shady umbrella. It was still overcast that morning so it wasn’t too hot yet. 

Dog friendly! 

Here’s the brunch menu at Royal Stone.

And the drink/pastry menu was on the back.

[cold brew on nitro / $3.75]

Jake ordered this for me before I even realized it was on the menu. He saw it when we walked up and asked for a table. He’s smart. I always love how cold brew on nitro looks like a stout beer with a really large head. This cold brew was strong but tasty. I had to add cream and a bit of sugar to take it down a few notches for my tastebuds but I drank every drop.

An overhead view of our shared breakfast. Though the coffee was just for me! 

[green eggs and ham benedict / $14]

I think it’s safe to say that I love eggs benedict. Poached eggs are apparently the only kind of eggs I want to eat these days. This version had a few things on it that made my heart swoon. First off… it has corn  bread toast. CORN BREAD. YESSSSS.

Then it has pork loin and a garlic pistou Hollandaise. A pistou is kinda like pesto sauce but without the pine nuts in it. That’s what makes the whole thing green! The hint of red on the plate is tomato powder which makes it seem extra fancy.

Jake was a little off-put by the color of this dish but me – I was all over that sucker from the get-go. And it did NOT disappoint! We were amazed by how flavorful that hollandaise sauce was! The pork loin was tender and was a nice thickness to really make you feel like you had a little bit of heft to your dish. The corn bread toast was soft, slightly sweet, and delicious paired with the eggs, pork loin, and incredibly good hollandaise sauce. Jake and I were amazed at how much we enjoyed this! 

[silver dollar pancakes / $5]

We also got an order of pancakes. Our waitress made sure to emphasize to us that the silver dollar pancakes were actually quite tiny. I appreciated the head’s up but that was exactly what I wanted. These tiny little pancakes were the perfect accompaniment to our tasty green eggs and ham dish. The pancakes were light and fluffy. They had a nice buttery crisp edge and that touch of powdered sugar gave it a tiny bit of sweetness. These little suckers reminded me a lot of the pancakes that I make at home (from scratch). 100% approved! 

[side of sourdough toast / $2]

They didn’t have the crazy toast I saw on Yelp available (Pullman toast?) so I asked for a side of sourdough. A little extra bread was a welcome addition to our meal. 

At Royal Stone they offered us some of their housemade strawberry jalapeno jam. I probably made a face when I heard what the flavor was but we decided to accept it. And actually it was pretty good. The jalapeno is just used as a flavor – the jam wasn’t really very spicy. It had a interesting twist to the sweet jam with that bit of jalapeno in the background. I liked it! 

Overall Jake and I really dug the breakfast we had at Royal Stone. It was the perfect amount of food to share between the two of us and everything was full of flavor. We were raving about the benedict we had even later in the day, reminiscing about how exceptional our breakfast had been. I think we’ll definitely be back here in the future!

Royal Stone
3401 1st Ave.
San Diego, CA 92103
(619) 738-8550

After breakfast, we headed to go on a little walk to explore the Spruce Street Suspension Footbridge. Amazingly enough, Jake and I had never been to this cool bridge before. 

It’s only a few blocks from Royal Stone and is the perfect destination for a little after-breakfast walk. The bridge is located at First Street and Spruce Street and spans across Kate Sessions Canyon. The bridge was built back in 1912 and was designed to allow people to get to the Fourth and Fifth Avenue trolley stops in the neighborhood. 

A little view over the bridge.

The day we went there were a bunch of people enjoying the bridge. There were people doing a photography session and another group of kids trying hard to make the bridge sway.

And boy does this bridge MOVE. I got a little freaked out when I stood still in the middle of the bridge. I think the best thing to do is to just KEEP MOVING as the bridge kind of sways and moves with your walking movement. 

As we moved onto the bridge, I realized that Short Round was having a HORRIBLE time with the moving bridge so I had Jake pick him up. Poor thing looks unhappy about this bridge crossing business. 

Maya on the other hand did totally swell! I just bought her a ThunderShirt last week and she’s been wearing it in the car and when we go on walks. It’s helped her to calm down so much and I’m so thankful that we got one for her. I’m certain if she wasn’t wearing her ThunderShirt that she would have also been freaked out by the swaying bridge. Luckily she remained nice and calm for the whole walk. Hooray!