10909 Jasper Avenue, Edmonton, AB

A few weeks ago I went to Central Social Hall for a Chef’s Table experience. Central Social Hall is located downtown, with a second location in St. Albert. It’s kind of a bar with upscale food, and a lively night life. I met with Jesse Kupina, one of the proprietors of Central Social Hall and learnt all about the establishment and the history. The reason why Jesse had invited me to come back was because during my last visit, the waffles were not quite up to par with what they regularly serve.

Admittedly, they had a few bumps in the road and changed their menu/chef a few times, but now, I would have to say that their menu for brunch is quite good. We were able to try a variety of dishes on this occasion.

First off, we had the Belgian Waffles. It’s housemade, and comes with a seasonal fruit compote, and chantilly cream. This was quite nice when it came out and the chantilly cream gave it just the right amount of sweetness. Overall really pleasant to eat.

Next was The Cure. This is shoestring fries, fresh cheese cruds, red wine gravy, poached eggs, avocado, bacon, and their roasted poblano & white cheddar sauce. This is exactly what you need to recover from a wild night out. Savoury, salty, everything that you might need. The fries were nice and crispy and the avocado/egg gave the dish a very umami taste.

We took a little break and then had the Santana cocktail. This comes with Jose Cuervo Tequilla especial silver, fresh grapefruit and lime, and a white chocolate syrup. This was really refreshing! The white chocolate syrup gave it a nice sweetness and overall it was a really interesting and tasty cocktail.

Our next dish was the Albacore Tuna Tataki and wontons. This comes with a tuna tataki and a stack of avocado, pickled ginger, cucumber, ponzu, and served with wonton chips. Overall a pretty good dish. I’m a big fan of sushi and raw fish in general. Personally prefer the tuna stack from Cactus Club, but still pretty good!

The perogies and sausage were probably one of my favourite dishes. Jesse has Ukrainian roots and refused to change their Perogie distributor for a cheaper/lower quality one. They are handmade potato and cheddar perogies served with crumble sausage, carmaelized onions, and sourcream. Definitely recommend ordering this dish!

Next item was The Beautiful Salad. Comes with Grilled herb chicken, avocado hummas, ribbon arrots, candy cane beets, watermelon radish, spinach, cucumber, quinoa, trape tomatoes, toasted sunflower seeds, and an apple cider vinaigrette. So many elements to this salad. Everything worked well together.

Lastly was their made-to-order doughnuts. Comes with cinnamon and powdered sugar and a rosemary anglaise dip. There still isn’t too many places in Edmonton where you can get made-to-order doughnuts that come out nice and hot. I really enjoyed this. The doughnut wasn’t too sweet and the sauce went well with it. Great way to end the meal.

As a bonus we also got an order of their Texas rub wings. Came out very crispy and delicious! The texas rub as a little bit of a heat to it and is a dry rub. Think salt and pepper but with a bit of heat and flavour. They also do free wings every Friday with a purchase of beverage! I’ve been guilty of going a few Fridays now!

Overall, I had a great time at my Chef’s table Brunch experience. Jesse made sure we were taken care of and everything came out nice and promptly. It is challenging to find staff and people who have as much passion as the owners/proprietors but I’d definitely go back for their brunch.