The Breakfast Club

Tough love is on the menu weekday mornings starting at 6, an hour later on weekends. So are thick white-bread French toast, sheets of scrambled eggs, slow-grilled new potatoes, and basic but effective coffee. The truckers, construction workers, and slumming Harvard Business School students who fill the vinyl banquettes seem to like it that way. For the faint of heart, bowls of fresh fruit, granola, and oatmeal are available with a look of disappointment on the side.

270 Western Avenue, Allston, 617-783-1212, thebreakfastclubboston.com