Starting the Day with a Good Breakfast

Saturdays are perfect for leisurely breakfast, a little something extra and you know what that means: more work. But it’s well worth the time spent preparing things you eat just once a week at breakfast. Lots of calories? Well yes, but you don't eat much the remainder of the day. This is stick with you food!

 Today, it was link sausage in maple syrup, poached eggs with cheese and garlic chives, grits, croissants with butter and blackcurrant jam and fresh oranges with mint. And of course, plenty of steaming black coffee to wash it all down.



Is anything more refreshing than fresh orange adorned with mint, picked just moments ago from the garden?



I have owned this set of Francisian Desert Rose china for many years. The pieces of this pattern they manufacture now looks like a bad imitation of the original. I rarely use this china but cannot part with it.

This napkin is from a set made by my mother, probably in the 1940s or 1950s, from flour sacking. Younger people probably don't know that flour, 5-lb, 10-lb. bags, were packaged not in paper but in fabric bags back then. Many little girl dresses were made from flour sacks in those days when times were hard. I love this print.



I added cheddar cheese to the grits, which made them "run." Ordinarily, the grits hold their shape better but the cheese certainly "kicks it up a notch." I find the flavor of pork sausage links to be greatly enhanced by adding maple syrup toward the end. Just let it cook down until it becomes thick and clings to the sausage. That little bouquet is my first lilac bloom, which I picked early this morning. The other flowers are the heavenly scented Korean Spice Viburnum. The placemats are linen, bought in Ireland, usually saved for special occasions, but I'm learning to make ordinary days special. Enjoy while we can. Who that we pass things down to are going to love them as we do?







I shot this picture several times, with and without flash, and still got the reflection spot but I think you can fill it in if you decide to try this chocolate tea. When I make it again I will increase the chocolate syrup to about 3 teaspoons.

And for desert, as if any were needed, I decided to try this recipe on the Lipton Tea box. Sounded interesting. So I made myself a cup -- I got a no thanks from my husband on this one -- and it is an interesting taste. I grated fresh nutmeg and anything is good with that! I may increase the amount of chocolate syrup the next time I make it, to say 3 teaspoons. How can you go wrong with tea, chocolate and these three very delicious spices.

Bon Apetit!