As it turns out, February is Hot Breakfast Month! And so I shall be making the most of this opportunity to stuff my face full of food that is not very good for you, but terribly tasty and much more comforting than cereal in the cold winter months. In Britain we have a good tradition of plentiful hot breakfast foods from which to choose. Pretty much all of these are perfectly suitable for any meal, despite being seen as predominantly breakfast food. I'll also delve a little into the history of some foods, if possible.
Full English Breakfast
Traditional full English
The full English breakfast is a prolific and much-loved meal comprised of common, if fatty, dietary staples, and is easily available in eateries all over the country. There are a few different regional and personal variations but the ingredients generally remain much the same. This meal was originally created by the Victorian well-to-do, and contained a variety of extra ingredients;
...In the house of a wealthy aristocrat you would typically find dishes of baked halibut steaks, fried whiting, stewed figs, pheasant legs, collared tongue, kidneys on toast, sausages with fried bread, pig’s cheek and Melton pork pie.
Full, hearty breakfasts were not just enjoyed by those of the higher orders, but also by the working classes who found them to be the best way to set themselves up for a day of hard grafting. This idea was popularised by Isabella Beeton in her 'Book of Household Management' commonly known as Mrs Beeton and widely acknowledged to be the first 'celebrity chef.' Her Book of Household Management was a runaway success and is incredibly still in print today.
Mrs Beeton
The full english breakfast as we know it today - the simplified version - became established in the post-war fifties, when tourism was on the rise across Britain and it became the standard fare offered by B&Bs across the country. My ideal full English consists of one sausage, one rasher of bacon, one fried egg, two hash browns, a few fried mushrooms, half a grilled tomato, beans and toast, washed down with a lovely strong cup of tea. My other half is more inclined towards larger portions of all of the above (except the vegetables) with a slice of black pudding too. It's all down to personal preference really, but pretty much everyone I know is a fan of this meal in some incarnation at least. It even exists as a vegetarian option in various hotels and gastropubs, although this may be considered to be heresy in some social circles.
Omelette
Omelettes are classic quick food, easy to make and a good way of using up any leftover food or fresh food that is approaching the end of it's edible life. Not quite as British as a full English, but much less time and effort to prepare. I love a good omelette. Upon investigation it would seem that countries around the world have their own variations of omelettes, which vary in thickness and main ingredients according to locality, but seem to abide by the same basic rules of shoving all your leftover fresh food into a beaten egg mixture and then frying it.
My perfect omelette - ham , onion, garlic & cheese, with Worcestershire sauce and pepper to season
Omelettes in their various forms have existed since the Middle Ages, so they have no identifiable starting point, they just seem to have been around forever. I did, however manage to find an unverified anecdote related to the French town of Bessières, Haute-Garonne, who have an annual tradition of creating a massive omelette at Eastertime. According to local legend Napoleon Bonaparte - interesting guy, you should read about him - was leading his army through their town and he was served an omelette by a local innkeeper that he loved so much he demanded that all the eggs in the town be collected and a giant omelette be ,ade for his army to enjoy the next day. The people of Haute-Garonne have been repeating this massive inconvenience to their town every year since. The truth of this matter will likely never be known, but this behaviour is in-keeping with what is known of Napoleon, and so I like to think it to be true.
Napoleon - big fan of omelettes?
Pancakes
I have a love/hate relationship with pancakes. I love eating them, they're tasty, delicious, and moreish; I can probably eat a good 5 or 6 before I start getting full. Vanilla ice-cream and maple syrup pancakes are my favourite. You can put pretty much anything on or in a pancake and it will almost invariably turn out to have been a good idea. On the other hand, however, making pancakes - simple as they are to make - drives me round the bend. It's incredibly messy (for me, at least!) and you have to make them one at a time, unless you have four frying pans and eight arms, something the usual cook lacks. This means that you either have to come to terms with the fact that at least some of your pancakes are going to be cold before you get around to eating them, or you have to make a pancake, eat it immediately, then rinse and repeat until full, neither of which are particularly good options. It's a lot of faffing for only a couple of mouthfuls of food, delicious though they are, and so we usually only have pancakes on Pancake Day. I also discovered relatively recently that pancakes are actually really unhealthy, which makes me sad.
Maple syrup and vanilla ice cream pancakes aka THE BOMB
Similarly to omelettes, pancakes have been around forever, in various forms. The earliest recorded recipe for pancakes appears in the Apicius Roman cookbook , thought to have been compiled around the late 4th century AD. As with omelettes, again recipes vary from region to region whilst remaining intrinsically the same. Pancakes also feature in some old lore;
“If you throw pancakes to the rooster and he eats them without calling the hens, you will remain single. If he calls the hens, you will marry.”
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Above is a selection of hot foods you could enjoy this month, but there are many more out there. Breakfast muffins with cheese and bacon, buttered crumpets and porridge to name a few. I've also stumbled across some interesting looking breakfast foods - such as hammy grits, and bacon, potato and egg breakfast casserole - that I've never had before, and I may give these a go at some point this month. This particular holiday is just like Christmas, in that it's a great excuse to eat delicious if unhealthy food all month long. Enjoy! ^_^
References
Top full English image http://theswash.com/tag/full-english-breakfast
Full English history 1. http://www.information-britain.co.uk/institutiondetail.php?id=2
2. http://www.englishbreakfastsociety.com/english-breakfast/history_of_the_traditonal_full_english_breakfast/ & quote
3. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/expatpicturegalleries/8451879/A-gastronomic-history-of-Britain.html
Omelettes 1. http://www.foodtimeline.org/foodeggs.html#omelettes
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omelette
Pancake image 1. http://www.food.com/recipe/cinnamon-pancakes-with-ice-cream-and-maple-syrup-441260
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pancake
Pancake history http://pancakelovers.com/history/
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