9 reasons to break up with your snooze button and begin a breakfast affair

Coffee cravings, stomach growls, pounding head – sure, the early hours aren’t always pretty, but that’s no reason to scrounge for excuses. Don’t be a daybreak hater, be a breakfast maker and swap cereal for Burmese soup, Afghani eggs or a stack of Canadian pancakes.

Source: Feast magazine

1. Avoid hipster-dom, go straight to the health food source

Before quinoa and chia seeds were de rigueur, clever Chinese grandmas helped cleanse their clan with a steaming pot of congee. Packed with goji berries and several superfoods of the future – gingko nuts, red dates and white fungus – this recipe is a winner in health, vitality and flavour stakes.

2. Poached eggs aren’t just for perfectionists

If you’ve ever shied away from breakfast experimentation due to fear of (egg) failure, we can heartily assure you: there is hope. Stopwatches are for sport, not a poaching pot, and that’s why one intelligent Israeli decided to create shakshuka. With tomato, chilli and plenty of garlic, this quick, yet impressive egg dish from Feast is a guaranteed gold.

3. Breakfast is an all-ages event

Why should kids have all the fun? Serve yourself a stack of pancakes and let the children chomp on toast. If you’re going to do pancakes, do them properly and yes, that means a sacrilegious soaking of maple syrup, plus crispy bacon to boot. (Feast magazine, we like your style.) Hopefully your childhood metabolism hasn’t gone on holidays.

4. You can’t philosophise without a full stomach

Somewhere between a pancake and a fritter, these golden puffs, or lalangia from Feast, have been a popular breakfast food in Greece since the 6th-century BC. That means Socrates, Plato and Aristotle probably devoured them on the daily, and we could probably learn a thing or two from them.

5. Nachos for breakfast? Yes, please.

Call it a stroke of genius or simply making do, this Mexican breakfast recipe teams up tomato, fried egg and chipotle-bathed corn chips. To our party-lovin’ amigos, we say fuel up on the fried goodness and pick up the fiesta from where it left off.

6. Coffee comes in cake form

While most of us grab our caffeine hit from a steaming cuppa Joe, clever coffee-lovers know how to mix it up. These gloriously gluten-free vanilla latte squares from model-turned-raw foodie, Nicole Joy, contain walnuts, dates, coconut milk and that all important ingredient, espresso.  

7. What do Thor, Superman and Muhammad Ali have in common?

They’re all champions and they all (probably) ate breakfast. Learn from the masters and make the day count with a plate of Afghani eggs, fragrant lentils and pita, from the greatest Gourmet Farmer on earth, Mr Matthew Evans (care of Feast magazine).

8. Cereal is so last century

Break free from Western preconceptions and begin your morning with a bowl of Asian inspiration. Mohinga is a Burmese staple, usually served for breakfast, and this version comes from the globe-trotting chef, Luke Nguyen. Featuring fragrant lemongrass, chilli, noodles and a hot and sour fish broth, the soup is almost as enlightening as a bout of meditation.

9. It’s a smooth(i)er transition than you think

You swore you’d never be one of those smoothie-smirking, cool bag-toting, health food-haranguing “foodies”, but maybe they were onto something. Take a leaf from the pretentious playbook: it’s better to sip than skip. Try this strawberry, avocado and almond milk smoothie from My Darling Lemon Thyme for dairy-free deliciousness on the go, and let the hipsters keep their kale spiel.

 

For more reasons to roll out of bed, check out our breakfast recipe collection and start cookin'.