Nic Dempsey

I’m not good in the mornings. Even on lovely light summer mornings, I struggle to surface into conciousness. Weekday working mornings are the worse, it’s too early and there’s too much to do to get myself washed, dressed and in a reasonable state of mind

I want to be good at mornings though, I understand that getting up, maybe doing some exercise, then getting ready to leave the house and eating breakfast would be a good way to start the day. However, the reality of me in the mornings, means that this is never going to happen so I decided to be good at breakfast.

At first that meant, forcing myself to eat something in the morning rather than just chugging coffee and running out the house. Now it’s part of my routine and I plan breakfasts as part of my weekly food plan and if I don’t wake up full of the joys of a brand new day, at least I’ve eaten breakfast.

Eating breakfast is supposed to help you regulate your appetite through the rest of the day. For me, this only works if breakfast contains protein. Although I’ve become accustomed to it’s texture and eaten lots of porridge over the past year or so, if I have it for breakfast, I’m always hungry by mid morning, I know that for lots of people the reverse is true but that’s how it works for me.

Earlier this year I made a breakfast oatbake thing which was good but I had the same issues as with porridge and there was too much sugar in it for me to be comfortable eating it too often so it fell out of rotation. For the last couple of months most of my weekday breakfasts are egg based. I normally buy 12 to 15 eggs a week and eat most of them for breakfast, poached eggs on sourdough toast, egg cups (with or without the goats cheese) with peppers and carrots, boiled eggs with toast soldiers, frittata or my current favourite scrambled with spinach and mushrooms. With winter coming I may go back to the magic smoothie, which is quick and great during cold season.

On the weekends, my breakfasts are later and more indulgent, a sausage, slice of bacon, slice of black pudding with a poached egg and toast keeps me going until dinner time, pancakes with blueberry sauce, apricot crisp and yogurt, granola and yogurt. There are other less healthy breakfasts of course, the Boxing Day cold yorkshire puddings and roast beef, sometimes leftover Friday Night Pizza.

There is always breakfast though!