Breakfast is for many the first meal of the day; literally the meal with which one breaks one’s fast. Doctors and nutritionists encourage this first meal as the most important meal of the day and thankfully, based on what many of us right here in Jamaica eat (we’ve heard tales of rice and peas with chicken eaten at 5:00 am), opinions vary as to what foods are suitable for this. Individual tastes play a part, and are perhaps at their strongest early in the day. The type and quantity of food depend on the daily schedule; those who labour hard may break their fast with ‘Tea’ and bread, followed by a larger second breakfast two or three hours later.

The most flexible breakfasts are probably the Continental and North European buffets of breads, pastries, cheeses and cold meats or their Middle Eastern equivalents of bread, yoghurt, fruit and preserves. Really substantial breakfasts include the modern British fry-up or the North American eggs or options of waffles with maple syrup. Comforting bowls of hot cereal mixtures are popular, from Scottish oatmeal porridge to the rice porridges eaten across much of Asia. The French have a minimal approach to breakfast and break their fast on croissants and café au lait. Over in Spain it’s churros (fritters) and chocolate and many variations on the bowl of Muesli theme for those who think that cereal, nuts and dried fruit are key to good health.

The British feel that breakfast is one area in which they are experts and a ‘full English breakfast’ comprises: fried bacon, kippers, eggs, sausages and tomatoes, plus toast, butter, marmalade and tea or coffee, potatoes, mushrooms, jams and other trimmings like porridge. The Jamaican full breakfast is for many a Sunday treat, a truly leisurely affair best enjoyed with family and close friends. It’s so ‘full’ that many find themselves at the table for three to four hours. Like we did Sunday last as we enjoyed a truly Royal Plantation breakfast. Seated on the Terrace on yet another glorious day, I enjoyed my favourite papaya and ripe bananas for starters, bottled water served at room temperature (you’re encouraged with water at this temperature to drink so much more), hot chocolate and a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. The new breakfast menu offers baskets of banana bread, muffins and croissants. For the warm in spirit there’s peanut and plantain porridge (blended green plantain and raw peanuts with vanilla, nutmeg and cinnamon with your own choice of milk), and Bulgar wheat and cinnamon porridge (a brown wheat grain blended with cinnamon, nutmeg and a hint of vanilla finished with your own milk).

There are local must-haves too, like steamed callaloo and saltfish served with Johnnie cakes and bammy as well as fillet of escoveitched fish with a pimento pickle marinade, boiled bananas and Johnnie cakes and the Salmon/Ham Benedict: cured Atlantic salmon/ham topped with poached farm-fresh eggs with caviar hollandaise on bagels with grated parmesan.

Acknowledgement: The Oxford Companion to Food by Alan Davidson