One of my favorite meals is Breakfast Dinner. It’s not part of our regular dinner rotation, but, occasionally, we will make a full-on breakfast for our evening meal. There is something very comforting, but, at the same time, slightly rule-breaking, about cozying up at night to a big ole plate of some combination of pancakes, grits, bacon, eggs, biscuits, sausage, hashbrowns, muffins, and the like. I find my delight at Breakfast Dinner to be amusing, because I haven’t always been the biggest fan of Breakfast foods. Take, for example, eggs. Sometimes, I can be somewhat weird about food. And such was the case with eggs.
Growing up, Breakfast for me was usually a bowl of cereal. We had many varieties to choose from, like Trix, Lucky Charms, Sugar Smacks, Apple Jacks, Honeycomb, Alpha Bits, Fruit Loops, and others. If I ate the more 'nutritious' cereals, like Rice Krispies, Cheerios, or Wheaties, I topped them with a heaping spoonful of sugar. I spent most mornings reading the back of the cereal box as I ate cereal with milk. Then, as a teenager, I lost interest in Breakfast, and often skipped it. My mom knew, as all moms did, that 'Breakfast is the most important meal of the day', so she fretted about filling my tummy before I headed off to school. She started cooking me an egg for Breakfast.
I was a little wary of eggs. I thought they were very unusual, what with the clear gooey part and the wobbly yellow yolk. And, how would the goo suddenly turn white? And, what about the baby chick; what happened to it? I was not sure about eggs. For some reason, scrambled eggs were the most off-putting for me. I didn’t like the texture, and the jumbled nature, and, where did the white go, why was everything yellow? Like I said, I can be weird about food. I drove my mom crazy. She was frustrated, and despite her efforts, I was reluctant to eat the eggs she cooked for me.
One day, she made a hard boiled egg, and, it wasn’t the worst thing I had ever tasted, so I ate some of it. Pleased with the results, she asked me how I liked the egg. When I said “It was OK,” she, instead, heard, “It was the best thing I have ever eaten and I want to eat one every day for the rest of my life,” or something like that. Day after day, my mom boiled an egg and presented it, hopefully. I quickly decided that I actually hated boiled eggs.
Next, my mom started making Breakfast Shakes for me to drink. The base was something like Carnation Instant Breakfast, which she enhanced with extra ingredients. Sipping through my straw, I decided “It’s OK,” so I drank a decent amount. Elated that she had a winner, my mom produced a Breakfast Shake every morning, and depending on my mood, I drank a small to medium amount of it. Until she spilled the beans….
Around this time, the movie “Rocky” had come out. It was a really big deal, and immediately began to wield its influence in pop culture, in music, exercise, clothing, dialect, and food. Everybody knew everything about Rocky. My mom was no exception. In one particular scene, as part of his training regime, Rocky chugged raw eggs for a protein rush. My mom spilled the beans when she told me how glad she was that I was drinking the Breakfast Shakes, because I really needed nutrition for school, and she had been cracking a raw egg into the shake to give me that extra boost. I immediately pushed the glass away, never taking another sip.
I wasn’t concerned about salmonella, or bacterial infections of any kind. Nobody talked about raw eggs like that, back then; we often licked batter spoons and ate raw cookie dough. As soon as my mom fessed up about the egg, my imagination went into high gear. All I could think about was the egg and the straw. Think, if you will, about a raw egg sitting at the bottom of a glass, being ooey and gooey with all of its sliminess. Then, imagine what would happen if you stuck a straw into it and started sucking. Can you imagine what happens to the ooey, gooey, slimy, slippery, wobbly, slithery, viscous, thick, syrupy substance that travels up the straw? Can you imagine? I can. I cannot even maintain a normal expression on my face as I type about it. I mean, ewwwwwwww.
While I didn’t go into detail with my mom, I did tell her that I didn’t want to drink the shakes anymore. She volunteered to leave the egg out, but it was too late. I couldn’t trust another sip—how would I know that she wouldn’t make a well-intentioned decision to slip a sneaky egg in there? I couldn’t bear the thought of sipping a raw egg through the straw. Once the image entered my mind, there was no going back. Even if I tried to drink straight from the glass, I knew I would remember the straw image vividly.
My mom eventually gave up, as most moms do, deciding to let me figure out what to do about Breakfast on my own. I swayed back and forth, sometimes eating, sometimes not, depending on how much time I had and what foods were available. To me, it was not a big deal, and it didn’t need to be made into a big deal. Eventually, I found my gateway food into eating eggs: the omelet. Once the egg was mixed with an interesting variety of tasty ingredients, I found it to be delightful. As time went by, I learned to eat eggs scrambled and fried and poached and frittata-ed and quiched. I’ll still have to say that boiled eggs are my least favorite, but I can eat them from time to time.
So, I’ve made my peace with eggs. Now, I don’t think twice about whipping up eggs for Breakfast in the morning or for Breakfast Dinner at night. In reality, I've decided to ignore the unanswered questions about the mysterious nature of eggs. It's best not to dwell on things like that. So, despite my early misgivings, I've found that eggs can be quite enjoyable. As long as nobody brings a straw.