It’s not every day that you’re the first ever customers to eat at a restaurant. And how special was it for me and MDP to be the first table sat at Willow & Whisk, the much-anticipated new breakfast, brunch, and lunch spot in downtown Millburn.

As soon as we walked in, the vibrating energy was palpable. A staff member gallantly welcomed us through the double doors, and once inside, we were met with delighted exuberance from the hostess, who exclaimed at the thought of a table for two – at exactly 8 am on their opening day!

As we were guided to our table, I looked around to take in the warm, sunlit space that stands in stark contrast to the Charlie Browns that once took up this corner many years ago. From the recesses of my memory, I recall a dark, handsome, even crowded interior at Charlie Browns, tables at angles flanked by visitors from Millburn and beyond for prime rib weeknight specials. In contrast, Willow & Whisk has completely reinvented the space, seeing it as a slab of stone to carve their unique imprimatur into. The dining room has dots of two- and four-person settings, with some using the wraparound booth as part of the seating arrangement. Nearly floor to ceiling windows take up two sides of the building, so you have a great people-watching experience while inside. There’s even a massive tree in the middle of the dining room floor, just beyond a dedicated bar, where they serve up creative cocktails and mocktails. This is not your mom’s Charlie Browns, that’s for sure.

The place is an obvious gem that’s going to be overrun with customers starting yesterday. The only regret I have about Willow & Whisk is that they do not serve dinner (the exterior sign specifically calls out breakfast and lunch). However, I encourage you to promptly make a reservation on Open Table for the hours they are serving up their delectable fare.

Onto the highlight reel: Breakfast at Willow & Whisk.

When you sit down at your table, you have a placemat with the Willow & Whisk brand mark on it in front of you and a set of silverware in a small paper bag, along with a napkin. The water glasses await either tap or sparkling water, depending on your preference. You’re also handed a drink menu (relevant to the time of your meal, I imagine) and a paper copy of their food menu, so no need to fret about QR codes, which are so 2020.

For my drink, I opted for the Maple Harvest Latte, which I requested to be prepared with almond milk and iced, while MDP ordered a Nitro cold brew, which we were informed was unavailable due to needing to set up the machine (the literal only first-day glitch we encountered). Instead, MDP got a regular cold brew. My latte was outstanding: daintily doused with maple syrup, the latte had a slight sweetness to it but it was the cardamom “dusting” that truly made the flavor profile remarkable. Part of me wants to drop by to pick up this latte any day, although I don’t know if that’s even an option (can I make it one?). MDP reported the cold brew was so-so, perhaps a little bitter.

We were there for a weekday breakfast so we did not indulge in the various appetizer type plates they offer. Given the overall experience I had, I encourage you to try them. The shareables range from frittata bites to pumpkin spice poppers (seasonal, I imagine, and accompanied by – get this – pumpkin spice cream cheese, swoon). You should definitely bring a hungry friend with you and sample some of the share items, which could even serve as your meal if you order all of them and take a tapas approach.

The ”Mains” breakfast menu has something for everyone. Many egg dishes grace the page, while you’ve also got lemon ricotta pancakes (for the refined audience), overnight oats, and even a few breakfast bowl options. There’s also a brunch burger, which includes their hearty housemade breakfast sausage and something called “brown sugar ketchup”; sounds like a winner to me. Willow & Whisk clearly takes a liking to prosciutto di parma, as it accompanies a few dishes as standard and you can ask for it on a few others. I mean, who doesn’t?

Lover of all things tortilla chips that I am (a guilty pleasure), I ordered the ranchero scramble for my entrée. I also asked for a side of the fruit bowl. So, the ranchero scramble is amazing. Perfectly scrambled eggs – like the kind you’d see in TV ads that would be totally not real but represent the ideal – sit atop crisp tortilla chips, surrounded by a moat of the most delicious, slow-burn, pepper-forward salsa I’ve ever had. They must make it in-house, as I can’t imagine something this perfect coming out of a jar. Adornments of pico de gallo, mashed avocado, and crema complement the transcendent experience of this dish. You cannot go wrong with this one.

The fruit bowl is also an excellent choice. No freezer-burned melon appears in the vicinity, which is one of many tells that Willow & Whisk is the real deal. The bowl comes overflowing with sliced strawberries, bananas (at the just-right stage of ripeness), and blueberries. The menu lists it as $5, but I’d actually pay much more for this fruit bowl. In general, I found the prices of Willow & Whisk to be reasonable, if not low considering the portions and value of all the dishes we had.

MDP was similarly impressed with his main choice: the cacio e pepe scramble. I hadn’t seen something like this on a menu before, so I was particularly curious about what this would turn out to be. Reader, those perfect scrambled eggs I mentioned above are taken to an even more impressive level with mounds of pecorino romano and cracked black pepper generously mixed throughout them. This is a rich dish, for certain, which is partially offset by the inclusion of their mixed greens with a slightly sweet mustard-y dressing on the side. MDP’s one gripe was the choice of sourdough bread to serve as the foundation for the eggs. Although the bread was chewy and the Platonic ideal of sourdough bread, he needed a steak knife to cut through it as he was making his way through the dish, which may have felt a little disruptive as he eagerly plowed through those eggs.

In addition to his egg dish, MDP also ordered the housemade breakfast sausage as a side. For just $6, you get two hefty patties, and the sausage flavor is rather mild and the texture is dense. I found it to be a great bite.

Throughout our experience, the service was outstanding. Our waiter was prompt, got our orders right, and brought over the check (via one of those remote control situations I can use Apple Pay on) when we wanted to leave. We were in and out of there in about 35 minutes, so consider it a pre-work option if you can swing it. At the same time, the whole vibe of Willow & Whisk suggests you can linger, if that’s what you’re going for. And if you take my advice to have a multi-course meal, you’ll have good reason to enjoy the great vibes for longer.

This is an outstanding addition to Millburn, and I can’t wait to go back. Their lunch menu looks similarly intriguing, but I sense breakfast and brunch is the main event.