Breakfast of Champions

This has to be one of my most favourite ways to start a morning. First, take a bagel out of the freezer, pry it out from its coat of tissue, and stick it in the oven. This morning's lucky bagel was a plain bagel.


Fresh bagels or any variety toast just as well, untoasted fresh bagels are okay too. In fact, any sort of bread, toasted, untoasted or fried, will do fine (I also recommend fried whole grain), although nothing says "heck to the calories" quite like a bagel. Does 1 bagel really equal 5 slices of bread?

Then, the king of all breakfast foods, bacon. I usually use two slices, each cut into half. Which is just about right to cover the entire face of my bagel. Mmmm... Make sure you're wearing clothes that can afford to smell like bacon and fried food, especially if you're like me and don't have a working ventilation hood. Oh, and don't forget to check on your bagel! A word of caution about this regal food: it bites back! This photo was taken all of 10 seconds before the bacon spit at me.


If bacon is the king of breakfast foods, then the egg is his resplendent and highly versatile queen. Soft boiled, hard boiled, scrambled, or omelette-d, the royal egg is wonderful in all forms during breakfast. But, on a bagel, the egg has to be fried. Now, I know some people like to mess around with the yolk so that it cooks completely, which makes sense if you're eating breakfast on the run and don't want a mess. But if you've got the time and space to savour this breakfast, either alone or with loved ones, keep that yolk runny!


Now to assemble the feast. I like my yolk facing the bottom slice of bread, that way when pressure is applied to the bagel, the bread can sop up some of the lovely runny yolk and lessen the mess. On top of that goes the cheese (Provolone, in this case), the bacon, and the other slice. Tip: pop the entire thing into the oven, which not only warms everything back up again, but also allows the cheese to melt around the egg, further sealing it from yolk-seepage.


Doesn't Ms Tummy look like she's ready to devour the entire meal in one bite? Serve with your favourite morning drink, if you're starting to feel a bit guilty then some fruit juice might help alleviate that. With the yolk exactly as I like it, this is a messy, but supremely satisfying breakfast.