The Most Important Meal

Even guests who never eat breakfast when they're home have trouble resisting a well-appointed breakfast buffet on the road. A recent survey of business and leisure travelers in Asia by Le Méridien hotel group showed that 60 percent of leisure travelers and 40 percent of business ones eat more than usual when traveling, and more than 80 percent favor the buffet breakfast. However, only 38 percent of travelers said they were extremely or very satisfied with what hotels are offering.

Some hotels are trying to differentiate themselves by offering new takes on the breakfast classics. The St. Regis Bali offers guests Wagyu beef tenderloin and fried egg as an upmarket alternative to the traditional bacon and eggs, while the Cascade Café at ANA InterContinental Tokyo will start offering in July new breakfast items with a "Japanese" flavor, such as a buckwheat burger with deep-fried foie gras in tonkatsu sauce.

Le Méridien has partnered with Jean-Georges Vongerichten to create a few Signature dishes, à la carte or at the buffet. The French chef has concocted unconventional smoothies that combine fruit, herbs and spices—such as mango, chili and lime, or raspberry, pineapple and clove. He has also revised some well-known classics; the espresso-steamed eggs are a light and fluffy soufflé steamed with a high-pressure espresso steamer and served with toasted brioche. The croque-madame—a grilled ham and cheese sandwich topped with a fried egg—has been spiced up with a citrus-chili hollandaise sauce. The Signature Breakfast is available only in the chain's Asian hotels, but there are plans to roll it out in Europe and the U.S. by the end of the year.

© 2009