You may have noticed that we’re part way through Farmhouse Breakfast Week (20th-26th January 2013) here in the UK, aiming to highlight the importance of breakfast with a campaign called ‘Shake Up Your Wake Up!’ Coincidentally, I wrote a piece about breakfast early last week, focusing on the importance of a good breakfast for children before school and mentioning the Primary School Free Breakfast Initiative. This week, we’ve been struck down with illness again, but despite feeling pretty rubbish we’ve managed to keep up our good breakfast habits in order to have enough energy to start to feel better. We don’t always have time for a full cooked breakfast like this one, but on more leisurely mornings, this is our favourite – it’s a One-Pan Polish Breakfast, and I usually use a Polish garlic sausage (available now in UK supermarkets) to give us an extra boost, along with mushrooms, tomatoes, organic free range eggs and a sprinkle of dill – optional! This is the kind of breakfast my dad would cook for us before school. The best bit? There’s hardly any washing up!
Polish Charcuterie
The Poles love their charcuterie, which include sausages, such as smoked kabanosy and cured hams. Cold Cuts are generally known as Wędliny, whilst sausages are Kiełbasy. Polish charcuterie has been made since ancient times and it graces the tables of both the richest and the poorest Poles, often served as part of breakfast, but also often added to soups and stews. The basic processes of making Polish charcuterie involves curing, salting and smoking. In the UK, I regularly now see a few different varieties of Polish sausages and meats, the most popular being Polędwica Sopocka, which is a high quality ham made of pork loin, Polskie Kiełbasy, or Polish sausages, such as Wiejska or Sokołów and Kabanos, a thinner variety of smoked Polish sausage. Each has its own distinctive flavour, some have garlic, others more subtle herbs and spices. Here’s one way of eating Polish charcuterie, but you can also use it to make sandwiches, serve it as a cold cut or add it to pasta dishes or stews.
Eagle-eyed readers will notice that I over-cooked my fried eggs – I’m still adjusting to my new tri-ply copper pans, which retain the heat even when you take them off the heat! Ideally, your eggs should be just cooked and lovely and runny!
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I’m linking this post up to Helen’s Breakfast Club Event, this month hosted by Janice at FarmersGirl Kitchen with a theme of ‘Cooked or Baked’ breakfast!
I hope you manage to cook up a lovely Farmhouse breakfast – there are plenty of ideas for light healthy breakfasts, as well as more substantial cooked breakfast on the Farmhouse Breakfast Week site and you can search under the hashtag #BreakfastWatch for more ideas, too.
Here are some other breakfast ideas –
Polish Scrambled Eggs with Chives
Swiss Scrambled Eggs with Croissants
Healthy Hot Chocolate Breakfast Smoothies
Buckwheat and Buttermilk Pancakes with Pears and Maple Syrup
Honey Nut Toasted Oats with Ribena Berry Sauce
Happy National Farmhouse Breakfast Week!
