It is the most wonderful feeling to spin around St Stephen's Green and realise you can park anywhere - especially if you're coming in to do the Christmas shopping. To do that, you have to arrive by 7.30 a.m., which we did. The choice of parking spaces was dazzling as we approached the Shelbourne Hotel and we exuded smug well-being as we trotted in for a breakfast intended to set us up for a day's slog around the shops.
The diningroom was loud and clattery with the sounds of cups crashing on saucers and plates being assaulted by knives and forks. There was none of that early-morning hush that you get in truly fashionable hotels, but so much the better. Most of the breakfast mob were men in suits, lots of locals eating eggs and talking into their phones, some dapper Italians, a few American couples, some bemused Japanese and, among them all, a tweedy individual who wore his mobile clipped to a sort of necklace around his neck, like you get at the dentist to keep tissue in place. This left him free to tackle an enormous plateful of smoked salmon he had selected at the buffet. The buffet is the point of breakfast in hotels and the Shelbourne's is a huge spread of goodies that can be plundered again and again for about £11 a head. It's arranged in the middle of the room, which is probably good for portion control. You don't feel like piling the plate too high if everyone can see your bottom.
But first select your table, or rather try not to be manoeuvred towards one in the dingier corners of the room. We wanted a window table and felt entitled to one which was empty, but the hostess, called Attila, if you can believe it, made an exasperated sound and said that, since it wasn't made up, we would have to wait until it was. Fair enough, we would wait and we did, back beside the door until the cutlery and napkins were laid. "She can carry the name," whispered Emer. Still, we had our view of the Green and this was a lot better than sitting at home dishing out cereal to sulky offspring.
Menus came next, but we took our time, nibbling in a ladylike way at the toast as we contemplated 1,000 calories of fry. A Manuel-like waiter took our order of full Irish breakfast (Emer) and kippers for me. You really don't need a hot breakfast here because the buffet is so good. Everything looks fresh and there's nothing curling at the edges. There were big dishes of fresh fruit, stewed prunes and yoghurts, jugs and jugs of different juices, lots of cereals presented in tall, see-through jugs, chilled full fat milk and skimmed, masses of different breads, croissants, scones, muffins and cake, and a vast tray of meats and cheeses as well as the smoked salmon. You can have different teas, coffee or mineral water.
My grapefruit tasted freshly-squeezed, but the orange juice was less convincing. Our coffee was average, though hot - but what a job we had getting fresh toast! We asked for it three times and nothing happened. Then three lots came at once, the last one carried by Attila herself, who gave us a look as if to say "I know what you're up to".
The fry was man-size, and almost sizzling hot. Emer loved it, and I wished I hadn't bothered with kippers. They were plain, kippery and full of teeny bones, as you'd expect them to be.
We weren't offered refills on our coffee, but that was OK. It's better to be left alone than harried at this time of the day. We stayed until after nine and came out into bright sunshine, ready for anything.
I arrived at the front door of the Morrison by 8 a.m., only to be waved at by a man with a mop inside, who pointed that I had to go around the side. Inside, all was calm and dark, with pools of light illuminating the odd velvet cushion or ethnic artefact. The restaurant had about six people sitting riffling through newspapers. At the centre of the room was the Morrison buffet, two round tables with a more minimal display than that at the Shelbourne. Bowls of fresh fruit were grouped around a very ordinary display of oranges and apples with a dejected-looking pineapple in their midst. There were croissants, plain and chocolate, bowls of cereals, cheese and cold meat, all nicely arranged but lacking the cornucopic approach one seeks in a breakfast buffet.
There were lots of empty tables but I was seated between two other people, creating a busy little area when what we all would have liked was a bit more personal space. The table was laid but had sugar scattered all over it from the last occupant. Coffee came in a smart metal jug, but it was too weak to have been much use as a wake-up and not hot enough either.
There's a short menu if you feel like more than the buffet. An incredibly thin man to my left ate his money's worth: two chocolate croissants, a full rack of toast and a bowl of cereal. He managed to make it look like a religious experience by eating very, very slowly.
I ordered poached eggs Morrison-style, at an astonishing £10 - though for that you get the buffet thrown in. Toast arrived, brown and white and hot, and I had some immediately. The jams were in those fiddly little jars, and unremarkable. The poached eggs were superb. They came on a square, black plate on top of a round, white plate with a Chinese spoon holding some deeply eggy buttery sauce. Two eggs sat on either side of a rosti round - a posh hash brown - with a brown disc on top that looked horrifyingly like liver, but turned out to be mushroom. And on top of all that there were strips of smoked salmon. The sauce dissolved into a buttery pool on contact with the hot plate and was useful to bind together all the different combinations - rosti and egg, smoked salmon and egg, mushroom and rosti, toast and smoked salmon. Extremely yummy from start to finish.
There were only three newspapers available and they were all FTs, so I found out all about M&S's disastrous interim results while waiting for a fresh coffee - this time a decent espresso. The music was monotonous house stuff, and after a while it gets in on you, and the 20-foot high black screen that cuts off the serving area is just crying out for someone to get at it with a ladder and a can of spray paint. I paid my £12.50 and left, making a detour by the Ladies' downstairs, where things are even darker. Cleaning was in progress in the loos with the usual smell of Jeyes fluid and some girl making heavy work of arranging the toilet paper so it points down. Oh dear. Shouldn't all that be done by 9 a.m. in a top-notch hotel?
Breakfast solo at the Morrisson cost £12.50; the bill for two at the Shelbourne came to £29.75.
The Shelbourne Hotel, St Stephen's Green, Dublin 2; 01 6766471
The Morrison Hotel, Ormond Quay, Dublin 1; 01 8782999
