More importantly, what are you going to have for breakfast tomorrow? Are you a cereal and coffee sort of person? Do you add a nice measure of antioxidants in the shape of blobby blueberries? Or do you like a fresh bagel? (One of these days I would like to make it to Russ & Daughters in New York and try a bagel and a schmear for myself…) Or do you zip into a fast food drive-through and furtively indulge in sausage biscuits? Are you a cheerful sinner and pretend that homemade granola is good for you? Are you a loathsome kale smoothie sort? Or do you merrily fry up a huge full English, mindless of cholesterol and calories? (https://www.russanddaughters.com/)
We were on vacation over the Christmas holidays, and for six breakfasts our son, the Tall One, merrily wolfed down full English breakfasts. The rest of us sat groggily eyeing the sheer bulk of what he managed to consume daily. In the time it took me to scape butter and slosh jam on a croissant, he would already had torn through the beans, eggs, hash browns, bacon, fried tomatoes, fried mushrooms, two sausages and two pieces of toast. Occasionally there was a subtle variation: scrambled eggs one day, fried the next. There was the morning he chose to eat blood sausage instead of basic bangers. Happily, for the rest of us, there was no haggis on the menu.
Other tales of people’s breakfasts can be as boring as listening to stories about their dreams, or as yawn-worthy as looking at someone’s seashell collection. That is unless you are sitting across a table from the Brobdingnagian plate of foodstuffs that are disappearing into a young man’s capacious maw, which completely overshadow your humble and ridiculously small bowl of Meusli. One can comment with shock and awe as the bacon disappears; food as heroic sport! And I haven’t even mentioned that some mornings the Tall One would order seconds. Golly.
Recently, on Slate’s Political Gabfest, the New York Times writer Emily Bazelon was soliciting advice on how to change up her breakfast game. She was tired of yogurt and wanted something easy and delicious to eat every day. After Bazelon took a good amount of ribbing for her banal conversation gambit, she did receive much advice and many recipes. And luckily for us, the Internet is full of more advice and recipes. I doubt if anyone suggested a full English breakfast, which is surely the stuff of vacations, not the everyday routine subsistence.
(True confession: Mr. Friday has been away for a week, and only once have I stooped to eating cold pizza for breakfast. He is from the cereal, fruit and coffee tribe, so I try to act my age around him.)
Here are some breakfast sources I have found while trolling the web:
The smart folks at Bon Appétit make it all look easy. https://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/slideshow/breakfast-to-go
Here is a delightful Tumblr with some fascinating breakfast ideas. Never would I have thought of a chocolate, banana and mint egg roll for breakfast! https://firstwefeast.com/eat/eat-this-tumblr-what-should-i-eat-for-breakfast-today/
And in greater detail, here is what Marta suggests in the way of a light breakfast: https://whatshouldieatforbreakfasttoday.com/tagged/light So much better than Cheerios, or cold pizza for that matter!
I steadfastly refuse to eat chia seeds. I don’t care if they are the latest life-enhancing discovery of nature’s bounty. Nope. No way, no how. https://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/chia-seed-breakfasts
Here is Emily Bazelon’s original lament: https://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/gabfest/2015/11/slate_s_political_gabfest_bonus_segment_brainstorming_breakfast_with_emily.html
“Her cuisine is limited but she has as good an idea of breakfast as a Scotchwoman.”
[Sherlock Holmes, on Mrs. Hudson’s cooking.]
― Arthur Conan Doyle
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