Sunny side up...
I've returned and with me, I bring you...breakfast for dinner.
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It’s safe to say…
…that I’ve missed you all dearly. Life, over the past few months, has felt a little bit like constantly being at the top of a rollercoaster. There was a quick driving pace to the tipping point and then I lingered...for too long. Instead of cruising down on the drop, I sat there in anticipation for weeks, months even. You see, everything happened so quickly. I was brought on for a television job which took most of my energy and time (and possibly years off my life and plus, it expedited the usual time it takes for my hair to turn grey). Simultaneously or really - smack in the middle of this crazy work load - Gianluca and I decided to legally get married, which turned into a small house party. More to come on the wedding - I may have to dedicate an entire post to it as the food was insanely delicious - would you like to hear about it? Maybe not? You tell me! Gianluca’s family flew in from Rome to stay with us in New Jersey between Christmas and New Years. It was full of beautiful memories with friends and family, yet it took place during one of my more intense periods of work.
Without reliving or rewriting the past few months, I will start here by saying, you didn’t miss much. Albeit, I missed so much of this space - of sharing stories and food with you all. The thing is, I barely cooked for creating new recipes or even cooked for pleasure. I cooked merely to sustain and satisfy hunger. I know we all go through these periods of highs and lows. Life truly is a rollercoaster - one minute you’re up and the next you’re down. Cooking and being present in the kitchen is a bit like that too. There are moments of despise as you stand over the burner wondering how on earth you’ve dirtied more dishes than there are people you’re feeding. And there are moments when you feel completely happy to prance around, dirtying another pan just for the sake of trying a new sauce or adding another element to the dish.
It takes creativity to cook and be in the kitchen - even if you think you’re “just following a recipe”. There’s still a way in which you are adding your own creative flare. It comes in the form of how you decide to cook the dish, maybe put your own spin on a recipe, or even how you serve it on the plate. I missed that feeling of creativity over the past few months. I had completely shut it off to make space for spreadsheets and cameras and client relations. To say that it’s easy to turn it back on would be a lie. It’s scary to step back into this space after shutting down my creative side. I starred at this page waiting for words, waiting for hunger to drop me an idea for a recipe…but nothing came. It wasn’t until I saw an old man riding a bicycle. It may sound strange but this old man on his bicycle was my muse that day.
The old man and his bike
The day I saw the old man on the bicycle just so happened to be Pancake Day or, in England, “Shrove Tuesday” - in other parts of the world, “Mardi Gras”. This man on his bike caused me to do a double take. A stop in your tracks kind of double take. It’s funny because there really shouldn’t be a correlation between the bike, the old man and the story I’m about to tell you. No, in fact, it’s really a story that never actually happened. You see, my grandfather once came to my house and reported to me that he was going to buy a new bicycle. He didn’t even have a bike at the time so it would be new, one and only bike. He would buy this bike and cruise around the neighborhood. A man, who, at the age of 80 with two hip replacements under his belt and had probably not (I would have guessed) been on a bike since the year 1990, wanted to purchase a bike and take it for a spin. But that’s the kind of man he was. He was a dreamer of all the things they tell you are impossible. He never bought the bike and that’s ok. He still had a childlike dream of riding his bike and to me that’s more than enough.
Flash forward to the present - to the day I saw the old man, who, might I add looked like my grandfather, riding his bike on Pancake Day. And so, this man on the bike sparked a moment of joy. I knew I had to make one of my grandfather’s signature dishes - pancakes with a sunny side egg on top.
You might be thinking, why would you put a runny egg on top of pancakes? Well, it’s the only way my grandfather would eat pancakes - served pipping hot, with slabs of butter, a runny egg on top, and doused in maple syrup. The story goes that when he was in the Navy, the food was always slopped together. Food that didn’t go together was spooned and pilled on your plate as you walked down the cafeteria line. I’m not sure if they were eating pancakes with sunny side up eggs on the Navy ship, but he always claimed that’s where his habit stemmed from - everything all mashed up on one plate. There’s something a bit strange about the way the egg yolk mixes with the syrup and spongey pancakes. The sweet, savory, and unlikely combination makes the perfect breakfast for dinner meal. I can hear my grandfather calling me to tell me, “we’re thinking breakfast”…which meant they were thinking pancakes. And without fail I’d drive down the street and I’d cook us pancakes with runny eggs on top almost every weekend.
I even found an old voicemail from my grandfather…we’re thinking breakfast.
Just like that, I eased myself back into the kitchen. Breakfast for dinner. Nothing better in my opinion. It’s a chance to take the ordinary, flip it around and serve it up as something fresh and new - the only thing new being that you don’t “normally” eat breakfast foods at dinner time. A great segue back into creativity. What sides did I want to serve, savory or sweet, bubbles or sweet wine? The comfort of being back in the kitchen but of also cooking pancakes, for me, gives me safety. I know how I like the pancakes - thin almost crepe like. I know how I like my eggs - sunny side up and very runny. I know that both of these will bring me home, even just for a moment in time.
So this is your sign to change it up, flip things from the ordinary and make them extra-ordinary. Pancakes for breakfast with a sunny side up egg on top.
Pancakes for Dinner
Now I’m not going to tell you how to make your pancakes. My grandmother swore by a box of Bisquick Pancake Mix. The only thing she changed was the amount of milk that was recommended on the box. Instead, she would continue adding milk until she got a thin crepe like batter. I still do that with any homemade pancake recipe - I add milk until I like the consistency of the batter. So most of the time, I’m eying out the recipe. Below is a simple recipe I pulled from one of my cooking school text books. I’ve doubled the recipe because, well, you can never have enough pancakes - they freeze well and make easy breakfasts!
Make sure to fry up an egg and serve on top of your pancakes with a drizzle of maple syrup. Trust me when I say, it’s one of the sloppiest yet most delicious combinations you’ll whip up.
Traditional Pancakes
Serves 4-8 (depending on how many pancakes you can eat)
200g of plain flour
1 Tbsp of baking powder
2 pinches of salt
2 generous pinches of sugar
30g of butter
2 eggs
300ml if milk
Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Melt the butter and let it cool. Mix all the wet ingredients together and slowly incorporate into the bowl with the dry ingredients. At this point, check to see the consistency of your batter. If you like fluffier and thicker pancakes, you can keep your batter as is. If you enjoy thinner pancakes (like me) you can continue adding milk until you reach the consistency you like.
Most definitely serve with a sunny side up egg on top and syrup. I also added a few sides which included prosciutto, ham, sausages, jams, pickles (yes, pickles), and gruyere cheese.
Until next time at a standing reservation…
With love & snacks,
Paige
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Need a happy moment?
My 6 year old niece, Zoë, thinks I make the best pancakes in the whole world. You’ve heard it here first folks. It could be a ploy to have homemade pancakes whenever I visit, or she genuinely loves my cooking. I like to believe it’s the later. But she’s pretty smart for her age so I put nothing past her. Here she is in 2022 on our Spring break trip to Orange Beach, Alabama. She’s always been my little sous chef in the kitchen. We’ll be together for her first Spring Break as a kindergartener and look forward to seeing what we cook up - I’m sure pancakes will be on the menu. And in some ways her love for my pancakes is like a little nod from my grandfather.
Yes I do like your Breakfast for dinner but never an egg on pancakes for me🤷♀️
Hi Paige , great story, it’s good to see your back writing. Your Wedding was the best 🥂