Miss Shirley's Cafe, Inner Harbor

We visited Baltimore this weekend, and we couldn't leave without trying some of the best restaurants in Baltimore, Miss Shirley's was beyond delicious. Whenever we come back to the city, this will be our top #1 breakfast/brunch spot for sure. Service could be a little improved, and friendly staff could be nicer.

We had Poppy’s Fried Chicken sandwich, Chicken n Cheddar Green Onion waffles and the Funky Monkey Bread. Everything was delicious - cooked & seasoned perfectly. We come here for breakfast/brunch every time we are in town.

The food was great but the server Vasyl could have checked on our table to see if we needed anything cause there was a time when we all needed water and had to ask him to come to the table when he should've have checked. We will be going back but hopefully we get a different server.

After years of hearing great things about Miss Shirley's, and seeing it on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, not to mention countless lists of the best brunch places, I was so excited to be in Baltimore to finally try it. I cannot tell you how disappointed I was. The host told us there would be a 35 to 45 minute wait, but it actually only took about 25 minutes before we got the text that we could be seated. Of course, they weren't ready to seat us yet, so that took another 10 minutes before we got a table. Our server was very nice, but a little absent minded. We asked for water and coffee while we looked at the menu. She came back a few minutes later to ask if we wanted something to drink. We repeated the coffee and water order. She came back again a few minutes later, empty-handed and asked again if we wanted something to drink. Really... Well, we finally got coffee and water, but the coffee was lukewarm and bitter. Milk and sugar couldn't fix the bitterness. Who knew that the bad coffee was going to be a precursor to the bad meal that followed. I ordered the stack of buttermilk pancakes with a side of shredded potatoes. My mother ordered the 4 mini Belgian waffles, with a side of applewood bacon and shredded potatoes. When the food came, the presentation was fine, but it wasn't hot at all. Not even a little bit warm. The huge ball of whipped butter on the pancakes had no hope of melting even a little bit since the pancakes were ice cold. My mother said her waffles were hard, cold, and tasted like frozen Eggo waffles. They were barely warm at all. The maple syrup wasn't warm, so it wasn't like that could help the situation. My pancakes were so dry, that I constantly had to sip some water to get some moisture. That is NOT an exaggeration. That cold syrup was no match for those dry, dense pancakes. They just soaked up the syrup, never to be seen or tasted again. The bacon was just chewy, with no real flavor to it at all. The potatoes weren't hot, either and the onions were just a step away from being raw. They were barely cooked and looked like they had been thrown in with the potatoes as an afterthought. There was no seasoning, so it was just potatoes and almost raw onions. My mother ordered the cinnamon apple donuts to go, hoping they would be decent, but when she got the box, it looked like one of those plastic food models that you see as a display in some restaurants. Well, it tasted like a plastic model, too. We had to heat them up to get even a little hint of the maple glaze flavor, but who knows where the apple and cinnamon were. You couldn't taste it or smell it. I didn't think it was possible to mess up straightforward breakfast foods like pancakes, waffles, and hash browns, but sadly, Miss Shirley's proved me wrong. We ended up paying over $80 for one of the worst meals I have EVER had. I so wanted to love this place and so wanted to be able to sing its praises, but I cannot. Maybe they were having a bad day, and we got the worst of it. I hope the low quality we experienced isn't what people have been raving about, because if it was, heads (and taste buds) need to be examined. Whatever the case, these prices are unacceptable for what you get. You can get a better meal in the freezer section of your local grocery store. Restaurant quality, this was not. I definitely won't be back. It was absolutely terrible.

To me ..... it's a tourist spot. Taking southern favorites and messing them up with attempts to "upscale them." I.e. crab hash, was like a corn salad with chunks of lump crab .... that's not hash! Then, sit the wet "not hash" on top of the tasteless fried green tomatoes! My over-easy eggs were so deflated from getting cold before served .... it's hype... NOPE! Service was great. Servers were congenial.

Great vegan options!!

First stop during my first time visiting Baltimore! Once arrived, we were immediately seated. The service was EXCELLENT and the food was also!! I ordered the French toast...by far the BEST I've ever had!