We live in a weird neighborhood. It’s stereotypically “up and coming” with a fine mixture of luxury apartment buildings, Starbucks, new restaurants, and homeless people. We even have a needle drop right next to a luxury hotel being built!  Gotta love NYC.

We always get excited about new restaurants opening up in the area (except when there are 4 Irish pubs opening within 3 blocks of each other in the same month… strange).  On his walk home, Mike mentioned there was a new brunch place on 9th Avenue and 40th Street, so last weekend, we went to check it out.

Better Being 940 had just opened its doors this week, but not really. The official opening is tomorrow, December 10th at 8am (with an “awesome assortment of baked goods, a yummy egg sandwich and complimentary Stumptown coffee”).  Besides having a name that I cannot possibly seem to remember, had all the makings for a place I wanted to love.

A fun  menu of things I wanted to try…

With some of it written on a giant chalk board behind the register.

And a quirky interior…

Everyone behind the counter looked at us with the same glance as if to say “I put my heart into this joint so I hope you’re enjoy it!” Everyone that is, except our waiter. Who was confused by things like “water” and “allergy.” I’m not sure if he was nervous, new to the English language, or just confused in general, but we just scratched our heads and kept on trucking.

Mike ordered the meatloaf sandwich (which was supposed to come with fries or a salad… neither of which it did). The sandwich was just “ehh.”  Average with the arugula making it a bit too peppery.

I ordered the very interesting sounding Souflancake. (“It’s not a souffle. It’s not a pancake. It’s both!”)

It came topped with “seasonal fruit” (berries in November)?

I really, really, really wanted to like this.  But I couldn’t. It didn’t have the fluffiness of a souffle nor the breadiness of a pancake. It really just tasted like an egg omelet with fruit on top. And I just cannot wrap my head around eggs with fruit.

We asked our very confused waiter about the bacon we ordered, and he said it was on its way.

Within moments, we smelled that great smell of bacon just starting to cook.

It was actually quite tasty, but VERY greasy. It could have used a pat down before being plated.

Just as I was resigning myself to not like this place, despite its potential, a woman who must be an owner came out and offered us peanut butter rice krispie treats on the house. I used to make something similar with my mom as a kid, so the nostalgia was really enjoyable.

As we were heading out, the same woman came up to us to ask how we liked it. I was very honest with her about the soufflancake, but her earnestness just made me feel so bad that I didn’t like it. I WANTED to like it.  This place has everything I love.  And I have hopes that once they get out these early kinks and test some recipes, they will have something great.

I hope I hope I hope!

For now, I will review it only on what we had, with a strong desire that next time we go back, it will be awesome.

Total Nom Points: 5.5 out of 10

Tags: 9th ave, better being 940, brunch, garment district, hell's kitchen, meatloaf sandwich, midtown west, pancake, restaurant review, restaurants, souffle, souflancake