Croque of gold

We like a croque-madame at Fine Dining. There's something very mouth-pleasing about its eggy hammy breadness, although we were once bitterly disappointed by its naughty husband, the croque-monsieur in a beer garden in the Lake District.

Here's a croque-madame we had at chain restaurant Café Rouge in Cardiff Bay. It got us through a hangover and was nice and comforting and all friendly-like. We put a load of ketchup on it and it didn't seem to mind. That's your croque-madame: easy-going. So we were somewhat alarmed to learn about the croque-madame's bigger, brasher, beefier Portuguese cousin – the francesinha. Terrifying. We're not sure we could manage one of them. It would be like getting beaten up in your stomach. Although the chips look like they'd be amazing dipped in that sauce. It's got two kinds of boozes in it!

Here's a recipe...
And here's the blog, I Just Like To Eat, that we borrowed the francesinha picture from.

Sunday best

A fry-up at Canteen (never had such a cress-heavy full English breakfast before) then a lovely lamb roast at the recently refurbished The Ship in Kennington. My companion had the beef. Now what's for tea?

Two hungry men

A breakfast at Jury's Inn, Brighton.

The twelve eats of Christmas: 7

A lovely, yolky bacon and egg sandwich for breakfast. Thanks Mum!

Breakfast The Fey Way

A breakfast sandwich from the Stage Deli in Manhattan. Fried sausage, fried egg, extremely fried streaky bacon, all served between two thick slices of very fried bread. The only thing that isn't fried is the cheese, but to their credit, they did melt it slightly to bring out its own natural oils.

This sandwich has a name: it is called the Tina Fey.

The twelve eats of Christmas: 2

Starting Christmas Day off with a delicious bacon sandwich at Marc & Sam's house.

English gentleman

A slightly poncey full English breakfast with an alarming-looking fried egg and a quenching drink made from cranberry, rose and elderflower or something at Canteen. Nice. I had a peppermint tea too, which was very refreshing.

Hanging over

An apple juice, an Earl Grey tea and an absurdly floppy microwaved cheese and tomato croissant at "tea drinking place" – ahem – Yumchaa – AHEM – in Soho. A hangover cure of sorts. All on a nice tray with elephants on. Lovely and relaxing.

England sandwich

Posh chain restaurant Leon have drastically faffed around with their breakfast menus. It's out with the breakfast baps and in with the slightly silly breakfasty "New York Breakfast" open sandwiches. And these. Which I could get addicted to. Bacon and cheese grilled sandwiches. Toasties, basically. Tidy. It's nice to have a reason to eat cheese for breakfast.

I said "breakfast" and "sandwich" a lot there...

Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit

Slightly poncey Welsh rarebit with a poached egg on the side at Canteen.

Archives of pain

A chocolate croissant and a black coffee outside the National Theatre. Somebody was playing the guitar.

Brecwast

Two breakfasts at the lovely Plough hotel in Rhosmaen, South Wales. A poached egg and beans on toast, and then the following day, a vegetarian breakfast involving an impressive Glamorgan sausage.

Self-assembly breakfast

A bacon and fried egg sandwich on the roof terrace at the Blue Fin Building.

Small fry

Breakfast at the Blue Fin, eaten off a tiny plate, Liz Hurley-style.

Windermere 9: Something beginning with "ch"

Cheesy beans for breakfast, chips at Bowness-On-Windermere, and lovely chilli for tea, cooked up by Log and based on the Leon cookbook recipe.

Windermere 6: Monday breakfast

Windermere 1: Friday night & Saturday morning

We went away to the Lake District for a week, and stayed here. Chips for tea on the first night, then Andy made a fry-up for breakfast the following morning. Lovely.

Fried

A fry up on Newburgh Street, after seeing the Covers exhibition.

Our Pillars breakfasts

Following on from the previous post, here's what we had to eat in Pillars.
Me: Sausage, egg, beans, fried bread
Disappointment: Sausage, bacon, beans, fried bread
I'm sure that's not a hair in my egg...