TASTE • DINE Scottsdale’s OEB Breakfast Co. has a menu that boasts elevated breakfast dishes. (Photo courtesy OEB Breakfast Co.)
A Virtual Eggs-plosion Breakfast joints are sweeping the area By Kristine Cannon
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arlier this year, Oregon-based Biscuits Café expanded into the northern Scottsdale area. In late spring, popular Phoenix-based Matt’s Big Breakfast announced its expansion into the Scottsdale area, to take place sometime in the fall. In September, Tucson’s popular brunch hot-spot, Prep & Pastry, celebrated 64
its grand opening at the Scottsdale Waterfront. Calgary-based OEB Breakfast—which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year— opened its first U.S. location late last month in Scottsdale. There’s been an influx of breakfast and brunch restaurants in Scottsdale and throughout the Valley in 2019. But why now? And why the Valley? “We’ve always been unique in a way that we’ve been a test market,” says Steve Chucri, president and CEO of the Arizona Restaurant Association. “Because we’ve been a melting pot of California, people from the Midwest out West, people from the East Coast, very few people are natives
DECEMBER 2019 | JANUARY 2020 NORTHVALLEYMAGAZINE.COM
here. And so, as such, we have had ideas and concepts tested here.” The breakfast segment may be thriving now, but according to Ryan Field of Plated Projects, Over Easy was one of the first to hit the market. “And we look forward to ongoing continuous growth throughout Arizona,” says Field, Over Easy’s franchise partner. Over Easy opened its first restaurant in 2008 in Phoenix. Now, the franchise has six locations in Arizona, with two more opening in Downtown Chandler and North Scottsdale this month. Over Easy also plans to expand into Flagstaff by the end of the year—and open new eateries in Mesa, Queen Creek, the