Popovers and Reminiscing

Breakfast is my dad's meal. For the life of me I don't think I ever witnessed my father prepare (from scratch) anything other than breakfast food my whole life. My fondest memory of his kitchen adventures totally revolve around a mental picture I retain of the state of the kitchen after he had finished cooking...flour everywhere, as if the experience was not complete unless there had been a baptism of some sort (and this transpired every single time). To this day, morning is my father's oyster and though he no longer engages in the grand production of yesteryear breakfasts I still think he reigns the breakfast hour. I love breakfast food myself, Prosciutto with Figs, Buck Rarebit, Croque-Monsieur, Spanish Omelet, Quiche Lorraine...but these are not the dishes my father would crave, one has to keep it simple to appeal to his taste buds. I turn to Herb Popovers with Butter Eggs to salute my dad this Father's Day. Out will come my all time favorite breakfast guide, a 1990 The Book of Breakfasts & Brunches Kerenza Harries, HP Books. You know how some introductions to cookbooks just read like accolades, acknowledgments and blah blah blah, well this one is different it traces the significance of the breakfast meal and the various means by which it can be delivered. There is a specific reference to brunch that caught my eye when I bought this book way back when. It describes brunch, combining both breakfast and lunch, so loved by the Americans, Australians and English, as reminiscent of the splendid English country house breakfasts served in the 1800s. "Breakfast for their house guests ran from early in the morning until the final stragglers appeared later in the day, and there was a wide choice of sausages, bacon, fish and egg dishes set out on the sideboard." We have something just like that here, Southern Graces housed in the Beaufort Inn,that on any Sunday is truly reminiscent of those English country sideboards. But for Father's Day we keep it simple because were it any other way it would not be a fitting tribute to a man like my dad who's influence and love made breakfast a meal memory that I'll relish a lifetime.