Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Hugo Arnold has some tempting suggestions
We are to be found in our garden, enjoying breakfast, that most underrated of meals, at every available opportunity. I know some like to term it brunch, but I cannot bear to do away with a meal, it seems to fly in the face of reason. Choice is my motto, when it comes to breakfast. Spread it all out and let everyone decide for themselves.
I like to start with a big bowl of cut fruit, maybe with muesli, granola or yoghurt. Is there anything to beat just-cut melon, hulled stawberries or heavenly peaches when the fruit is good and the sun is out?
I've been known to produce large plates of the traditional cooked breakfast. But my children demand pancakes, and preferably pancetta. They kicked up about bacon, complaining that the white stuff that oozed out wasn't nice. Now I fry dry-cured bacon and pour the lot, fat and all, over the pancakes, which we top with maple syrup.
Recent breakfasts have included Parma ham on toast, topped with a poached egg; eggs sitting on top of roughly broken kippers in ramekins, the whole lot baked off in the oven.
I have a passion for potatoes at breakfast time; I'm told it probably has to do with their starch-driven energy provision. Mushrooms, preferably the large, field variety that produce a dark and dense, meaty aroma and flavour, can be a real treat. If they are big enough, a fried egg plonked in the upturned cavity is a winner. Topping it off with a slice of crispy bacon works wonders.
And let's not forget those most common of all items on a breakfast menu, toast and marmalade - something bittersweet and with bite. Now what's for lunch I wonder?