Côte Restaurant, The Mailbox, Birmingham

Repeat after me: Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I'm not telling you something you don't already know, am I?

Despite being the mantra for a better way to start your day for God knows how long, I'm still amazed by the number of people who go to work on an empty tum.

"I feel sick in the morning. The last thing I want to do is eat."

If I had a quid for every time someone's said that to me I'd have sacked this off and be sunning myself on a yacht in Monaco.

Instead I end up quipping, "You feel sick because you are hungry. Now eat."

Or . . . "I'm just not hungry in the morning. I don't know how you can even think about food."

How could I indeed? It's at least 12 hours since I last ate. To be hungry is just unreasonable, please forgive my stupidity.

I, on the other hand, start the day with the raging hunger of a grizzly bear. In fact, the larger the dinner I've had the night before the hungrier I am. Breakfast is the last thing I think of when I go to sleep at night, the first thing I think of when I wake up. Sorry Mr Emily. It's true.

It's a meal for champs. End of. Starting the day with a mammoth bowl of porridge with a banana and a slug of maple syrup, or a triple-decker smoky bacon butty and Tommy K will have you taking on the big bad office boss and winning. Trust me, I'm not a doctor.

And there's no better way to start your day than by eating out for breakfast.

This is one of life's little luxuries. I'd rather eat breakfast out than any other meal. In the unlikely chance I get to release my cover version of Julie Andrews's My Favourite Things I'd swap the bit about whiskers on kittens and warm woollen mittens for 'breakfasts in luxury establishments'. Doesn't quite rhyme but then again, I'm not a poet either.

I am however, a glutton and my obsession with eating brekkie in places other than at my own kitchen table has proffered all sorts of adventures. Like the time I headed to the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo to sample the world's freshest sushi at 4.30am. But the pungent smell put me off (my western constitution only has the stomach for Sugar Puffs, not salmon, at that time of day). I cried and had ice cream instead.

Or there was the time at The Wolsely – the place for a gourmand to start the the day. I ate yogurt and peach puree out of a giant gold goblet (it looked like the fake Holy Grail in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) before tucking into a gruyere cheese omelette so fluffy it'd make your pet rabbit look like a Brillo pad.

Or the trendy boutique hotel in Argentina which served its breakfast items in shot glasses from light-as-a-feather scrambled eggs to mouthfuls of exotic fruit smoothies.

And none of my happy brekkie memories would be complete without the pilgrimage to Bill Granger's place in Sydney to fill up on the eggs, sweetcorn fritters, homemade fruit loaf and five grain porridge that I'd spent many hours gazing at pictures of in his much-loved cookery books.

Yes, that's right. I'm bonkers for breakfast.

But these places are all well and good, happy times and all that, but where can you get a good breakfast round here?

Following my extensive research, one of my favourites is Côte in Birmingham's Mailbox. It's one of the very reasons to still go to the Mailbox, which has been virtually shut down – save Harvey Nics and a few restaurants – while they put a roof on it.

Côte's part of a medium-sized chain of French-style bistros which I've found to be a notch up from places like Café Rouge despite not much of a discrepancy in price. Its daily set menus, in particular, provide exceptional value, giving diners the chance to sample dishes such as sea bass or mackerel rilletes, with two courses for just over a tenner.

The a la carte menu features all the usual bistro fayre from steak frites and tuna niçoise to spinach and mushroom crepes and roast duck breast. Desserts include French staples such as chocolate mousse, crème brûlée and crêpes.

But on this occasion we were here for breakfast, or had it been the 1980s, brunch.

Rather ironically, since I've harped on about breakfast for the last two columns, we toyed with ordering lunch – it was 11.45am, after all. However, the brusque waitress made it quite clear this wasn't an option, even though the menus were on the table and by the time we'd have received our food it would have been after noon.

So, breakfast it was. We started with drinks. Côte provides complimentary bottles of filtered water which is a nice touch. In so many restuarants it still feels a bit taboo to request tap water – here you don't have to. It's delivered on arrival. We also ordered a cranberry juice and black coffee for mum; mint tea for the other half, and a flat white and sparkling water for me. The flat white was superb; strong, rich coffee but with the right proportion of milk and froth to make it a different drink from a cappuccino or a latte.

The breakfast menu is split into light options which include traditional pastries, sandwiches and items such as granola and yogurt, and fruit salad, and cooked breakfasts offering up warm crêpes with gruyere cheese and fried eggs, and eggs royale. There are also breakfast cocktails, like Mimosas and Bloody Marys for those feeling truly decadent.

Hungry after a morning run in the park, I greedily ordered croque monsieur and fruit salad. The other half chose the eggs Benedict, and mum couldn't resist the sound of the French cooked breakast, although she was also wooed by the smoked salmon and scrambled eggs.

All plates arrived well presented, although it was the French brekkie that was the real show-stopper, comprising chive-flecked scrambled eggs, a giant glistening field mushroom, crispy smoked bacon, slices of black pudding and toast. The bacon was just the right side of crispy without being overcooked, while the eggs were light and flavoursome. The highlight though, were the slices of deeply savoury black pud. Slightly crumbly in texture, it was more piggy than the set of Babe. Mum, a funghi aficionado, said the mushroom was tender but still had good bite.

The eggs Benedict, with its impressively glossy hollandaise, disappeared within the blink of an eye, the other half praIsing the perfectly-balanced sauce and quality thick-cut ham. At £7.75, it seemed a rather small 'large' portion. He ordered a flat white to compensate – it received the same high praise.

In contrast, my croque monsieur, at £5.50, was enormous. Two doorstep slices of farmhouse bread oozing with ham and bechamel sauce, topped in bubbling melted cheese. It was easily as good as croques I've eaten in Paris, and I've eaten a few since it was the only thing I could afford to eat there.

I didn't really need the fruit salad I'd ordered so we shared it between the three of us. It failed to make much of an impression. Slices of apple and pineapple, and maybe a few segments of orange, weren't especially sweet but still welcome refreshment after the richness of the cooked food.

The waitress cleared our empties and even suggested that, now it was 12.30pm, we could order lunch and although tempting we were sated.

Service was efficient if a little aloof, although I'd rather this than pally overfamiliarity.

The bill came to just shy of £50 – not ridiculous for the amount of food and drinks we ordered.

If you're hitting the New Year sales then this is the ideal place to start your day. After all, there's nothing more annoying than having to stop mid-shop to refuel.

So, ladies, it's time to get your Côte. . .

ADDRESS

• Côte Restaurant, The Mailbox, 122 Wharfside St, Birmingham B1 1RX

• Tel: 0121 631 1587

• Web: www.cote-restaurants.co.uk/Cote_Restaurant_Birmingham.html