The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

When Mince introduced breakfast, desserts and drinks to its menu, the chain’s flagship branch in Zamalek missed out on account of it being too small. Thankfully, that’s not the case anymore following the move to its new branch on the island, which brought with it the full menu.

Located at El-Maraashli Street, opposite the old branch, the new space might seem to be just as small, but it’s actually much wider; there’s a hidden space that leads to the bathrooms. Normally, we’d be rolling our eyes at the mainstream industrial ceiling that so many restaurants have randomly adopted these days, but here the interior theme is, overall, industrial, with steel walls, black furniture and a wooden skylight wall that will lead you to the hidden space, as well as the brick walls.

We started our breakfast with Mojito Minto Cocktail (22LE) and Tropical Passion Smoothie (26LE), the latter of which is served in a cocktail mixer. Although most of the ingredients were artificial, the Mojito Minto was super refreshing thanks to its minty and lemony flavours from the lemon juice, mojito syrup, Sprite and a hint of fresh chopped mint. As for the Tropical Passion smoothie, it had a spot-on consistency and a perfect balance of passion fruit, strawberry and orange, with a bold mango flavour.

Moving to the food, we ordered a Frittata (29LE) and Beef Sausage Mince Benedict (46LE) as our breakfast dishes.

It might not have been as thick as a normal frittata should be, the presentation wasn’t the prettiest and we didn’t feel the presence of the fries in it, but this oven baked frittata was bursting with flavours from the pepper, the onions and the seasoning, in addition to the toast which worked perfectly with the whole dish, especially the soft feta cheese pieces.

Served with French fries and not-so creamy spinach, the Mince Benedict was served as a burger bun topped with a beef sausage patty and two perfectly poached eggs with mouth-watering runny yolk. The burger bun was super soft and light, too, but the dish was far from perfect; the top bun was just unnecessary and the beef sausage patty was super dry and lacked flavour. In addition, it was too small for the bun and, sadly, there was a no-show for the hollandaise sauce – and what’s eggs Benedict without hollandaise sauce?

We couldn’t leave without grabbing the mighty Elvis French Toast (42LE). The huge Nutella and banana French toast sandwich boasted a soft and custardy interior and a crispy caramel crust, topped with a giant serve of soft vanilla ice cream (14LE), chocolate chip cookie bites (14LE) and drizzled with luscious caramel sauce. There was nothing to complain about this masterpiece; the ice cream had a fantastic consistency and, surprisingly, the Nutella wasn’t overpowering like other Nutella desserts, while the cookie bites were a great crunchy element.

Overall, we’re delighted that we can finally have Mince’s full menu at Zamalek; the food had its hit and miss moments but overall it was a excellent experience and a great breakfast alternative.