This was published 5 years ago
A champion of breakfasts gives a toast to the weekend
Get out of bed, soak oats for bircher muesli, check morning emails. Shower, grate apple (the whole apple – core, skin and seeds), add honey, yoghurt, nuts, seeds, berries. Sit down at table, have breakfast. Wash two mixing bowls, two breakfast bowls, three spoons, a box grater, the chopping board and a strainer, wipe them dry and return them to their cupboards. Repeat daily, Monday to Friday.
It all takes a fair amount of time, and if I haven’t quite woken up, it’s not just the apple that I’m grating. But a good breakfast is one of the many small things that keep me going. There is as much comfort in the ritual as there is fibre in the oats and acidophilus in the natural yoghurt.
Besides, it’s not forever. Summer’s on its way, and with it the chance to replace that apple with stone fruit, mango and watermelon instead. Then it will be autumn and winter, and the morning ritual will segue into standing at the stove with a wooden spoon, stirring porridge for 7½ minutes; fingers intact.
But that’s the weekdays. During lockdown, when every day was Blursday, it became important to differentiate between weekday and weekend. The demarcation line, for me, became toast. It wasn’t the weekend’s absence of work or the presence of sleep-ins that were important, it was the eggs and bacon on toast. Smoked salmon and avocado on toast. Tomatoes, mushrooms or last night’s leftovers on toast; all good, all weekend.
Speaking of weekends – oh cafes, how we missed you. We love your toast and your coffee, and your buzz and banter, but we mainly love the fact that you’re not home. At home, if one person wants scrambled eggs, everyone has to have scrambled eggs. At a cafe, you can have any eggs you want. At home, you’re lucky to get bacon. At a cafe, you can have sausages, kimchi, baked beans, mushrooms, avocado, haloumi, ricotta, smoked turkey or all of the above.
Yes, I am aware that my breakfast strategies illustrate a petty need for control, but spare me the psychoanalysis. I’ve moved on, to the one great big existential question that remains: lunch.
theemptyplate@goodweekend.com.au
To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and Brisbane Times.
Terry Durack has been reviewing restaurants and seeking out new food experiences for three decades. Author of six books and former critic for London’s Independent on Sunday and the Sydney Morning Herald, Terry was twice named Glenfiddich Restaurant Critic of The Year in the UK, and World Food Media’s Best Restaurant Critic. Australian-born and a resident of Sydney, he brings a unique perspective on the global food scene to his travel writing.