February 1: I decided to make bacon and eggs for breakfast this morning. Actually, I decided to make bacon and eggs on Sunday (two days ago) but forgot, and felt that I better get the bacon cooked before it turned into a small furry carnivore in the fridge. I don’t remember the last time I cooked breakfast at home. It must be at least a year, but B and E is one of those meals that everyone can cook from memory so I had no worries.
When we had our cottage, my cousin James and I would have B and E virtually every Saturday morning. I would be up first and fry up a mess of bacon which I would divide into servings. I would put his aside in a warm oven and then I’d make the eggs and toast and coffee for me. When he dragged his dimpled butt out of bed around noon, there was nice warm ready-cooked bacon waiting. Simple, and I got quite good at putting it all together if I do say so myself.
I have a glass-topped stove that I find hard to regulate. When I got the bacon going this morning, the stove went from stone cold to far too hot in about 2 minutes. That meant that the bacon was spattering all over the place and generally making a mess of the kitchen. Trying to wipe up a bit of the flying grease, I scorched the end of one of my fingers and narrowly avoided turning the paper towel into a flaming, grease-filled torch.
With the bacon done, I had to dispose of the surplus grease in the pan. My dear Mother would pour this off into an old coffee can, and store it in the bottom of the stove. I have no idea why she kept it because I never actually saw her use it for anything – cooking or otherwise. Not wanting to keep it, I decided to put a paper towel in the bottom of a plastic clamshell package from some raspberries and dump the grease in there. That worked a treat until the hot grease hit the small amount of water in the bottom of the package whereupon a miniature gun battle broke out in the bottom of the sink with sizzling hot water and grease flying in all directions.
With the pan now cleaned out, I cracked 3 eggs and got them going. Fishing out the bits of shell always seems to take longer than it should. With that accomplished I put the toast on and started the coffee. This is the part of making breakfast that separates the men from the boys. It’s important that all these things be ready at the same time, so that they arrive at the table piping hot and ready to eat.
With the eggs just about done, I reached into the cupboard for the honey. This comes in a plastic tub that was apparently not well sealed when I last put it away. Being quite full, the top popped off and spilled honey across the counter and onto the hot stove. The top, now liberated from the tub, fell to the floor and like the proverbial butter on toast, landed honey side down. At this point, the kettle was screaming and the toast was growing cold in the toaster, and I found that, in lunging for the lid, I had burned one of the knuckles on my left hand.
In short order, I had the bacon, eggs and toast on the plate, and the coffee ready to go with the morning paper. The chaos in my kitchen took somewhat longer to overcome. I think from now on, I might just have B and E at the local diner. It’s much safer.