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511 9th St (corner of 8th Ave.), Brooklyn 11215 (Park Slope). (718) 499-1966. F to 7th Avenue.
Food coma:

Why pay for, or steal, cable's Food Network when you can eat at Dizzy's? The restaurant has both inside tables and sidewalk tables, but the big show is still at the lunch counter, where you can watch the cooks. Although the slacker-looking chef-owners have long paid their dues and replaced themselves with been Latin line cooks, who aren't quite as showy as the original cast, it's still a culinary SWAT team worth watching as they grill thick pork chops and respectable burgers, sauté omelets to succulent microscopic thinness as they sprinkle in spices, and bark sandwich and salad and garnish orders to a neighboring walled-off counter within their tiny kitchen. Ditch your party of four, which won't be seated soon anyway, and dine up front.

Popular Dizzy's, sharing its corner with an F-train entrance, replaced a miserable greasy spoon called "Coffee Shop" that was best known for its newspaper sales, not for its griddle. Torn apart and fully renovated, it is now a full-fledged restaurant serving homey food with exotic additions. The old sign hangs on a freshly painted wall. Stylish modern lamps hang above the lunch counter, and jazz (the place is named after Gillespie) or emo plays from speakers.

The "Eggs Ben-a-Dizz" brunch includes a wonderful basket of fresh little muffins, baked in the store and served with berry butter, but come early or they may run out. The entrée's speckled "ancho lime holandaizzz sauce" is pleasantly thick and buttery, with an always-pleasant spicy burn. English muffins are well toasted, and the Canadian bacon is flavorful and generous. Hot, cripsy home fries came with crisp onion and pepper. Fries are crisp, and lightly spiced. The mimosa had lots of champagne, and its too-large orange-slice garnish added some fresh juice and oils to the pulpless carton-based Tropicana. A friend and I tried the saketini recently. The first was delicious, with the liquor's distinctness balanced by the other ingredients, but the second round was weak.

Overall, portions are large. Dizzy's has shrunk its brunch menu to a $12.95 prix fixe with few entrées. Good-bye marinated steaks. The toasted-cheese sandwich has been relegated to the kiddie section. But you can still get poached eggs in fantastic corned beef hash. The delicious, peppery hash, shredded like pulled pork and mixed with home fries, tastes so much of corned beef and so unlike the canned, salty, yet more familiar minced-potato mush we call "corned beef hash" that you may be disappointed at how good Dizzy's is. The grilled veggie wrap - "roasted red pepper, grilled eggplant, zucchini, mixed greens, warm goat cheese, and a herb aoili wrapped in a spinach flatbread" -- is good, but its presentation does not favor the vegetarians who order it: the green, vertically standing rolls have long chives sticking out like insectile antennas.

The food is usually quite right, and the patrons an unpretentious mix ranging from twentysomething giggly couples to an elderly sweet old lady whom the staff sometimes feeds gratis. Manage to get in, manage to get served, and you're home free. Enjoy.

Rest rooms: Clean but barely enough room to stand, never mind sit.
Handicapped access: Plenty of floor space near the door, but the rest room door is narrow.

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Food, service

Food coma

Feeling perky
Slight fatigue
Must lie down