flying saucer eggs with grilled vine tomatoes, mushrooms and red chard

Healthy breakfast with grilled tomatoes, mushrooms, red chard and flying saucer eggs

I wanted a substantial breakfast to set me up for the weekend. This one does the job and is surprisingly healthy. Of course it would have been even healthier if I had left out the butter, but mushrooms and butter are a marriage made in heaven and I couldn't resist.

the full english!

the full english!

I have recently been rereading Phillip Kerr's wonderful Bernie Gunther detective novels. Don't worry I am not trying to convert anyone to the joys of detective literature, (although I would if I could get away with it!) No, there is definitely a food point to this posting. I am just going to make you work a little for it. 

bacon froise - an interesting breakfast!

bacon froise with tomatoes and mushrooms

A friend of mine who is a "furriner" is intrigued by the names the British give some of their more traditional dishes and I delight in feeding him the ones that are less likely to appear on a restaurant menu. So when he popped round on Saturday afternoon, I had thought to make an easy standby - "toad-in-the-hole", which is essentially just sausages cooked in a savoury pudding batter and served with gravy. Sadly I had forgotten to buy any bangers, so decided to revert to a "froise" instead, the name if nothing else, being delightfully cosy.

glamorgan sausages

glamorgan sausages

From Medieval times in Britain, most towns, cities and counties had a sausage of their own. These usually reflected the foods and herbs grown locally and the popularly used spices of the region. Think peppery Cumberland or zesty Oxford sausages.

Glamorgan sausages are first recorded in the 19th century, although I suspect that like many recipes had been around for much longer. Glamorgan sausages are skinless and don’t actually contain any meat, being a mixture of breadcrumbs and cheese.I am sure that any thrifty cook would have found these meatless sausages a bit of a frugal godsend, as well as being delicious.