Granite City Food & Brewery

FOOD

The omelet station brings cooked-to-order eggs into Granite City’s Lawless Brunch. Guests choose fillings and the station prepares the omelet, giving breakfast a made-for-you component among the ready-to-serve foods. It is a useful distinction in a broad buffet: the egg dish is cooked for the person who wants it, while the rest of the table can be considering a quite different meal.

Prime rib provides the strongest invitation to call brunch lunch. The advertised carving station serves it with au jus and horseradish, making a more substantial centerpiece beside the eggs. The appeal is the combination of carved roast beef and familiar breakfast choices in one outing. It lets a group enjoy the same occasion without requiring everyone to have arrived with an appetite for pancakes.

The French-toast station covers the sweeter breakfast possibilities. Strawberry, caramel and whipped-cream toppings are among the brand’s named choices. That makes the toast more of an individual creation than a fixed plate, with fruit and sweeter toppings available to change its character. It can be a main breakfast interest or a smaller sweet course after something savory.

Fresh-baked jumbo caramel rolls are another clear part of the brunch’s identity. They sit alongside an assortment of pastries, bringing the bakery into a meal otherwise quite capable of concentrating on eggs and roast meat. The caramel roll is the more distinctive named choice; the wider pastry selection can vary. There is a perfectly reasonable case for remembering the bakery before the meal is almost over.

Reggiano hash-brown potatoes add a cheese-based potato dish to the savory spread. Biscuits with sausage gravy offer another substantial breakfast accompaniment, while thick-cut bacon and sausage links supply the familiar meats. These foods make sense beside the omelet, but also give someone who prefers the prepared buffet plenty to choose from without waiting at a station.

Peel-and-eat shrimp brings seafood into the brunch, served with the restaurant’s cocktail sauce. Seasonal fruit, fresh salads and vegetables widen the range around the richer foods. They are part of why the spread works for different appetites: a seafood-and-salad lunch can share a table with a breakfast-meat plate, with neither needing to be the standard meal for everyone.

The chef specials add a changing element rather than another permanent checklist. Rotating pasta, egg and entrée features can join the named stations at Troy and Northville. The regular buffet has plenty of identity without promising the same special every Sunday. Omelets, carved beef, French toast and caramel rolls describe the occasion clearly; the changing dishes leave a little discovery for the actual visit.