The Full Monty on the Full English

We realise that we have not yet spoken of breakfast (aside from kippers, but perhaps that’s best left unrepeated). And that is a grievous error, because the full English breakfast is something to discuss. And breakfast is one of our five favourite meals of the day! Breakfast in the UK is traditionally a large and meaty affair, eaten at leisure. Interestingly, though, the large breakfast was pioneered by the upper classes and only later taken up by workers during the industrial revolution.

We parse here the contents of the full English and discuss the etiquette around the consumption of such a meal.

Full English Meats

Back bacon (different from that found in the US, and also not what we call ‘Canadian’ bacon) always appears. So do one or more sausages (sometimes of different kinds). Black pudding, white or black also regularly appear. (These are in their turn distinct from blood sausages because of the addition of oats, groats, or other grains.) If you are following along at home you’ll note that this is three distinct meats, and finding all three on one plate is not unusual.

Eggs

In these democratic days they will ask you how you want your eggs, but eggs were traditionally fried, two of them, looking challengingly up at you, daring you to eat the full plate of food. Scrambled have less personality, but are also less intimidating.

Other

A plethora of other options await you. Grilled tomatoes and mushrooms sauteed in butter are nearly always present, and toast is a regular accompaniment, with butter and marmalade or jam or both. Sometimes the toast is fried too because why wouldn’t you? Beans – white beans baked in a sweet sauce – have rather fallen by the wayside in many breakfasts we’ve had recently, and we think that’s too bad. A breakfast without beans can have you leaving the table hungry! [Ed. note: this is simply untrue.] Sometimes potatoes make an appearance, usually in hash brown form (but see below for regional variations.)

Beverages

Tea is the traditional beverage, with the usual accoutrements (but not nearly as elaborate as this afternoon tea). Also orange juice. Coffee sometimes takes the place of the tea, and we can live with this though it’s not traditional.

Regional and other Variations

• Irish breakfasts often include potatoes in some form (hash or bubble and squeak or boxty or a potato farl).
• Northern Irish breakfasts often include sodabread.
• Scottish breakfasts often include a tattie scone or bannock in addition to or instead of toast, and/or haggis instead of the blood pudding. Fish sometimes also makes an appearance (e.g. the Arbroath smokie).
• Welsh breakfasts often have laverbread or oatcakes instead of (or in addition to) toast. We’ve also heard of but never seen cockles in a Welsh breakfast.
• Vegetarian breakfasts are readily available and feature veggie sausages in lieu of all the meat. Sometimes avocado shows up in these breakfasts, looking disdainfully upon the rest in its green superiority. (It can hold its head up high in this company because it’s also got a lot of fat, albeit of a wholly different sort.)
• Sometimes, according to a pattern we have not yet discerned, ketchup or brown sauce or both, appears with the meal.

Post-Breakfast

There is no reason you need to eat all of this, as it usually comes in vast quantities served on a plate bigger than you have ever seen before. And there’s a reason this meal is often called a ‘fry-up’: every one of these except maybe the tomatoes and beans is likely to have been cooked in gobs of butter. If you do clean your plate, or even if you don’t manage it, just go back to bed. There’s no point fighting. Unless, of course, you are headed off to the mines for a twelve-hour shift, in which case you probably didn’t eat the avocado but otherwise you need all those calories.