Only YOU Málaga Brunch – Review

Only YOU Málaga’s weekend brunch at Carmen restaurant is one of the best ways to spend a Saturday or Sunday morning in the city. For 29 euros, you enjoy a starter, a gourmet main dish, a dessert, coffee, juice and a signature cocktail, served in the double-height ground-floor restaurant that opens directly onto the Plaza de la Marina on one side and looks up the emblematic Calle Larios on the other. It is available every Saturday and Sunday from 9.30 am to 1 pm.

Málaga is not short of places for a good breakfast, but a proper international-style brunch is still hard to find in the city. Carmen, the ground-floor restaurant at Only YOU Málaga, has filled that gap. The welcoming lobby dining space, with its signature long bar and glass doors that fold open to the terrace, allows you to feel connected to the life of the city even when you are sitting inside. On one side, the Plaza de la Marina. Carmen draws a good mix of hotel guests and locals, making it a buzzing venue for brunch.

How It Works

The set brunch includes an assortment of bread and butters, a matcha or coffee, a cocktail of the day or juice, and a yogurt with fruit and granola or an açaí bowl. You then choose a gourmet main dish. You can also order à la carte, as well as order sides like jamon, avocado, cheese etc. So its easier to fully personalise your experience.

What We Ate

It started with the bread and butters, served on a wooden table. There were three types, presented as little paired scoops, each just bigger than the head of a teaspoon. The goat’s cheese one was standout, and a tasty accompaniment to the selection of breads.

We had the açaí bowl and the yogurt and granola bowl, both good and we toasted the morning with a Bellini, fresh and delicate, and a classic mimosa.

The Wagyu burger was a gourmet version done properly, with tender, flavoursome meat, smoked cheddar, crispy bacon, soft lightly toasted brioche, and crisp fresh lettuce leaves. Very good. The Mollete Pedro Máximo was equally tasty, with aged beef tenderloin on a mollete with wood-roasted green pepper and fries. The mollete, for those unfamiliar, is the soft, white bread from Antequera and Archidona area, that has been the heart of the Andalusian breakfast for centuries, traditionally toasted and served with olive oil, tomato and serrano ham. This was a contemporary beef version of that classic, and it worked beautifully.

The Local Touch

What lifts the menu beyond a standard hotel brunch is the Andalusian thread that runs through it. The mollete bread from Benaoján. The Axarquía avocado in the croissant. The premium extra virgin olive oil with the broken eggs. The cheese and the Ibérico ham. Even the cocktail list has a local accent. These are international brunch dishes built on local ingredients.

Carmen is a relaxed, well-located room with a city buzz that makes weekend brunch feel like an occasion rather than a meal. If you are in Málaga on a Saturday or Sunday, it is well worth a visit.

You can read The Luxury Editor Review of Only You Malaga here.

Read The Luxury Editor’s guide to the best hotels in Málaga here.