Regency Dish: Breakfast

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I love breakfast!  So much so, that sometimes I eat it for dinner.

Yet, had I lived in the Regency era, I might have found the table set a little too sparsely to satiate my evening hunger.  Although breakfast as we know it was developed in the Regency era, it was obviously not yet valued as the most important meal.

A Typical Regency Breakfast:

Menu 1:

Tea, Muffins or Hot Rolls, Butter

Menu 2:

Chocolate, Plumb Cake, Eggs, Meat

Menu 3:

Toast, Tea, Pound cake

Menu 4:

Milk and oatmeal

Menu 5:

Milk and bread

Adventurous spirits may occasional have a bit of coffee or meat, but generally most preferred toast (either dry or with a bit of butter).  And as toasters weren’t invented yet (nor was sliced bread), toast would have been cooked over an open flame, most likely in a toast rack.

Eggs An egg broken into a cup of tea or beaten and mixed with a basin of milk makes a breakfast more supporting than tea solely An egg divided and the yolk and white beaten separately then mixed with a glass of wine will afford two very wholesome draughts and prove lighter than when taken together Eggs very little boiled or poached taken in small quantity convey much nourishment the yolk only when dressed should be eaten by invalids A New System of Domestic Cookery (1814)

cold before ground Coffee Milk Boil a dessert spoonful of ground coffee in nearly a pint of milk a quarter of an hour then put into it a shaving or two of isinglass and clear it let it boil a few minutes and set it on the side of the fire to grow fine This is a very fiue breakfast it should be sweetened with sugar of a good quality A New System of Domestic Cookery (1814)
with sugar of a good quality Chocolate Those who use much of this article will find the following mode of preparing it both useful and economical Cut a cake of chocolate in very small bits put a pint of water into the pot and when it boils put in the above mill it off the fire until quite melted then on a gentle fire till it boil pour it into a basin and it will keep in a cool place eight or ten days or more When wanted put a spoonful or two into milk boil it with sugar and mill it well
This is a very good breakfast or supper Cocoa Is a light wholesome breakfast Milk Porridge Make a fine gruel of cracked corn long boiled straiu off either add cold milk or warm with milk as may be approved Serve with toast French Milk Porridge A New System of Domestic Cookery (1814)

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4 Responses to Regency Dish: Breakfast

  1. Joanna Waugh says:
    November 7, 2008 at 2:28 pm

    Oh but what about “bubble and squeak?” I know it originated among the lower classes but IT TASTES SO GOOD! The dish was around well before the Regency period, although not popular with well-bred ladies.
    Check out:
    http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/bubble-and-squeak.html

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  3. anneglover says:
    November 7, 2008 at 9:19 pm

    Bubble and squeak, or a fry up of leftover roast dinner vegetables (typically potato and cabbage) can be part of the full traditional English breakfast (which I love!). Today, your full English breakfast would include toast, eggs (typically fried), tomato, baked beans, and sometimes fried potatos or hashbrowns. You might also get some sauteed mushrooms. Often, you will also get a choice of bacon or sausage (bacon being more similar to what Americans know as Canadian bacon).

    Popularized in the US in the 1920s and 1930s, it first made its appearance in press in 1898 as a “Scotch” breakfast.

    The full english breakfast, or “fry up”, now so familiar to guests at British hotels, is typically a weekend meal to be ate with leisure.

    Historically, something similar to the fry up would have been on the tables of rural working class, and likely not everyday. Less active gentry would have preferred petit dejeuner, except in cases (like house parties) where they had guests.

    The etymology of breakfast comes from Middle English, and is a combination of break and faste (or to fast). This stems from the concept that sleep prevents eating, thus when you awake to the first meal of the day, you are essentially breaking your sleeping fast. The verb dates from around the late 1670s in England.

    For more history on breakfast in England through the ages, check out: http://www.foodtimeline.org/foodfaq7.html#britishbreakfast

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