Full English & Breakfast
Fry-ups, kippers, kedgeree and porridge.
Full English Breakfast
The full English is less a recipe than a small parade: sausages, back bacon, black pudding, fried eggs, grilled tomato, mushrooms, baked beans and buttered toast, all pulled together with a strong pot of builders' tea. The trick is orchestration, not cooking.
Ulster Fry
A proper Northern Irish breakfast: sausages, bacon, black and white pudding, egg, tomato, and the two things that make it Ulster rather than English — a soda farl and a potato farl, both fried until golden in the pan.
Traditional Soda Bread
Irish soda bread uses no yeast — the leavening is the reaction between buttermilk and bicarbonate of soda. Ready in under an hour, best torn (not sliced) and eaten warm with butter.
Boxty Pancakes
An Irish potato pancake made from both raw grated potato and cooked mashed potato — the combination gives them their unique dense, chewy character. 'Boxty on the griddle, boxty on the pan; if you can't make boxty, you'll never get a man.'
Potato Farls
The potato half of the Ulster fry. 'Farl' means 'quarter' — the round of dough is cut into four triangles before cooking. Best fresh from the griddle, better still fried in bacon fat the next morning.
Tattie Scones
Soft potato flatbreads cooked on a hot griddle. A cornerstone of the Scottish breakfast — buttered while warm, or fried in bacon fat and topped with an egg.
Arbroath Smokies with Butter
Small haddock hot-smoked over hardwood in the fishing town of Arbroath on the Angus coast. They arrive ready to eat; a brief warm-through with butter is all that is needed.
Cockles & Laverbread
A Swansea breakfast. Laverbread is not bread but purple laver seaweed cooked to a dark savoury paste. Served with fresh cockles and bacon, it tastes of the sea and iron.
Laverbread Cakes
Small patties of laverbread mixed with oatmeal and pan-fried until crisp at the edges. A classic South Welsh breakfast dish, often served with bacon.