SUNDAY BRUNCH

* It’s Sunday, and there are so many crepes and omelets from which to choose. Here’s a sampler of Sunday Brunch destinations in Orange County, culled from recent articles. Other reviews can be accessed at https://www.calendarlive.com/go/discover.

Partners Bistro: Beach Fare With a Charming French Flair

Partners Bistro is a charming little cafe-style restaurant on Coast Highway in the hub of Laguna Beach. Brunch consists of appetizers, salads and entrees, all in the $7 to $10 range.

Start with either the pine nut-crusted goat cheese or the smoked salmon. The cheese is served with caramelized onions and peppers and a crispy flat bread. Salmon is served with the perfect sidekicks: cracked-pepper creme frai^che and a cool sprig of dill.

Try the Partners salad of tossed lettuce with crunchy bacon and blue cheese in a garlic-cream dressing. The spinach salad is a good mix of the fresh tender greens with chopped eggs and bacon in a light sauce.

The 12 entrees offered for brunch include a selection of French-inspired bistro food. Recommended main dishes include the small portion of tasty wild mushroom ravioli stuffed with ricotta cheese in a light herb broth; the petite filet with poached eggs and bearnaise sauce; and the wild mushroom frittata, a thin open-faced omelet smothered in mushrooms. For a lighter meal, the pastas come with tomatoes and pine nuts or artichokes and basil, both in light sauces.

A dessert tray offers a chocolate mousse cake with chocolate leaves and fresh raspberry puree, a cheesecake and assorted tarts. If you can have only one, pick the warm sweet potato pie, nutty and fragrant in a crumb crust, and topped with vanilla ice cream.

Partners Bistro, 448 South Coast Highway, Laguna Beach. (949) 497-4441. Brunch hours: 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Price range of entrees, salads and appetizers: $5 to $26.

Plums Cafe: Cranberries, Salmon Offer Nod to Northwest

As unlikely as it sounds, a small cafe wedged into a strip mall manages to bring a little bit of the Pacific Northwest to Costa Mesa. Owner Kim Jorgenson has brought some of her favorite foods to Plums Cafe, a hip little spot on East 17th Street. At first, only the potted pine trees circling the patio and a few tree sculptures hint of the Northwest. But a glance at the menu reveals imported flavors: Chinook salmon, fennel, cranberries and hazelnuts, all plentiful in Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

The “special brunch” is served daily, and that means that for $5 more than the regular breakfast price you get along with coffee or tea a choice of a Ramos fizz, mimosas, Bloody Marys, champagne or fresh squeezed orange juice. The brunch includes anything from the breakfast menu--a list of some two dozen exotic-sounding items, including ratatouille egg-white omelet, crispy coconut French toast and hazelnut pancakes.

Plums is the kind of restaurant that cares about freshness and flavor. The lemons presented with a deep-dish pancake come already peeled because the peel is used to flavor lemon-scented cakes in another dish. The whipped cream on the strawberry waffle is actually beaten in the kitchen rather than sprayed from a can. And the spinach and feta cheese omelet is sprinkled with baby yellow pear tomatoes, kalamata olives and fresh oregano.

Plums Cafe, 369 E. 17th St., Costa Mesa; (949) 722-7586. Sunday breakfast from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Prices range from $5.95 to $16.95.

* A new Sunday Brunch review will run next Sunday in the Orange County Calendar.