Toast Stirling: the busy breakfast cafe that hits the spot

It’s one of the city’s busiest breakfast and lunch spots – here’s why you should check out Toast Stirling!

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Today I’m talking about my favourite new breakfast spot – a cafe called Toast in the city of Stirling.

It always takes a while to discover the best places to eat in a new place. That might be when you’re visiting somewhere or it might be, as in my case, when you move somewhere. I just moved to the city of Stirling from Dundee a few weeks ago and I’m still settling into my new city. But it’s hard not to be charmed by what I’ve seen in this historic city so far…

Let’s talk about Stirling

Stirling is sometimes referred to as ‘Little Edinburgh’ and it’s not hard to see why. The city is jam-packed with history at every turn, from the imposing Wallace Monument that seems to appear in the skyline no matter where you are in the city, to the magnificent Stirling Castle, raised up a crag with echoes of the capital, to the cobbled Stirling Bridge, arching over the river below. I’ve loved seeing all of these landmarks in my new day-to-day life.

Getting to know a new city also means getting familiar with its food scene, right? I’ve tried quite a few places already. There’s Green Gates Indian Restaurant, which is just down the road from me – and so hard to walk past There’s also HBW Coffee, located in an old opticians (complete with signage) just a few yards from my house. It’s known for great coffee and for vegan doughnuts. I’ve tried both and I’d definitely recommend you try them. Toast is also a place I’ve heard a lot about.

Where is Toast Stirling?

Stirling isn’t a big city and that means that most places are only 5-10 minutes-walk away – which I love! Toast is a five-minute walk from the train station, bus station, and the town centre. It’s also really close to the cinema if you want to catch a movie afterwards.

Toast address: 2a Forthside Way, Stirling FK8 1QZ

What are Toast Stirling’s opening hours?

Next bit of important information – when you can visit Toast! The opening times for Toast are 9am-4pm Monday to Saturday and 9.30-4pm on Sundays.

What’s on the Toast Stirling menu?

Good news, the menu is vast. I thought that Toast was just a breakfast spot, but it turns out it’s an everything spot. Everything in the daytime at least. There isn’t a Toast Stirling breakfast menu per see – everything is just all on one menu. However, I was very much there for the brunchy things and there’s a wide and varied variety to choose from.

Expect to see everything from a full cooked breakfast, veggie cooked breakfast, eggs in multiple different ways, French toast, porridge with blueberries and walnuts, and more. The only thing I was slightly sad not to see was eggs benny as it is my absolute favourite when it comes to brunch food. But I guess it did make me try something different!

In terms of non-breakfast items, there are burgers, flatbreads, salads, bagels, omelettes, wraps, mac and cheese, fries – pretty much anything you could want.

You can view the Toast menu here

Anything else you should know?

Yes. There are two things that are important to know if you want to go to Toast.

You can’t book a table at Toast. You just have to rock up and take your chances. That is a little bit annoying if you’re running to a tight schedule but it’s probably a result of point number 2), which is…
Toast is busy. Before going there I’d walked past a few times, at different times of the day, and every single time it was jammed. Queues outside waiting for tables, kind of jammed. And that’s why I reckon they don’t take bookings.
What does that mean for me?

Well, it means that you’re probably not going to be able to just pop down. You will definitely need to allocate more time in case you have to queue for a table for a while. With that said, when I was there the food came out pretty quickly despite the business!

My review of Toast Stirling

We rocked up to Toast at about midday on a Sunday and it was packed out, with two or three groups of people ahead of us in the queue. You could also see lots of people sitting at stools facing out to the windows, so it was clear that we weren’t the only ones thinking, oh, wouldn’t it be nice to stop by the nice breakfast fast for some food this morning.

I’m not gonna lie: my heart did sink a little. I’m not a patient person at the best of times and I was a bit worried about having to wait 30 minutes+ just to get a table. As it turns out, we were in luck. The waitress approached us and mentioned that we could sit outside if we fancied. For me, this was the perfect result. It was one of those crisp late September mornings where it was cool but sunny – and it was definitely warm enough to sit down for an hour or so. So we leapt at the chance and took a seat at one of the outdoor tables.

Although we sat outside I did get a chance to peek at the interior décor when I went inside to pay and it is lovely! It’s a got a bit of a maximalist vibe with patterned wallpaper, black and white tiles, and some ornate pieces, such as a large rectangular lovely gold mirror, glinting on the wall. The space is pocket-sized and perfectly adequate, but they could definitely do with more space to create more of a cosy vibe on cold winter days. I could definitely see this café being twice the size as it is now and still making a killing!

What did I order at Toast?

I debated over many of the breakfast items at Toast. There were so many tempting choices – scrambled eggs on toast, the veggie cooked breakfast with halloumi, the warming porridge with walnuts and blueberries. In the end I went for the woodland eggs, which was scrambled eggs with crumbled feta, mushrooms, spinach and pine nuts on granary toast.

I was slightly worried I’d made the wrong choice. Would it be too healthy? Should I have just gone for something more classic, like smashed avo and eggs on toast? I shouldn’t have worried – it was really delicious and made a nice change from the usual suspects. My boyfriend got the soup of the day, which was lentil, which came with thickly buttered slices of white bread, which he really enjoyed too. All in all, we were both really impressed.

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