Beans for when you’re up all night

I’ve just been thinking about my most memorable breakfasts and, strangely enough, I notice a pattern developing.

About 25 years ago, I remember sitting on top of a mountain near the town of Corte in Corsica watching the sun come up. I was eating chocolate and sipping bottled water and I remember thinking I was lucky to be alive. The night before, in order to stay alive in unexpected sub-zero conditions, I’d had to remain awake the entire time feeding a fire with lumps of gnarly pine. As you might imagine, the following morning’s chocolate tasted like sunshine, although I had to wait for the bottled water to thaw, as it had frozen solid over-night.

Twenty years later, I was on top of another frozen mountain, this time Eagles’ Rock outside Draperstown. The Glasgowbury Festival had just finished and since I hadn’t eaten in hours, I was fit to be tied with hunger. Just over an hour later I was sitting in McDonald’s holding a hot coffee under my nose and waiting on an egg McMuffin and two hash browns. On this occasion the simple fact that the food was warm made me feel as though I was filling my body with new life.

However, my most memorable breakfast of them all was in a small café in Strandhill in Co Sligo. It was just before Covid and, true to form, I’d been camping the night before, this time in a completely inadequate sleeping bag on the September-cold, Sligo ground.

“To Shells Café!” I announced when the other members of the clan had awakened; I had been the only nocturnal.

And so it came to pass that home-made baked beans with chorizo and buffalo mozzarella atop toasted sourdough with a poached egg became the best breakfast in living memory. Washed down with a spectacular black coffee, I can still remember feeling the warmth rush back into my body, after the long, cold night. It was, quite simply, divine.

The common denominator to all these great breakfasts is not the sleeping rough or the brushes with death or the woefully inadequate camping equipment (the repeated winters of my discount tent) but rather the breaking of the fast happening when it was sorely needed. It wasn’t the right food at the right time but rather any food at the right time (hence the McDonald’s hitting the spot).

I have often thought of that Shells Café breakfast, although I have stopped short of ringing and saying, “Hi, gone gimmie the recipe for them beans, hi.” I haven’t lost all the marbles just yet.

This is my version of the home-made beans with chorizo and buffalo mozzarella atop toasted sourdough with a poached egg. Don’t forget to add a good touch of freshly ground black pepper.

INGREDIENTS

Good glug of olive oil

1 large onion, chopped

1 bacon slices, chopped

200g of chorizo, diced

1 tsp of ground cumin

1 tsp of oregano

Half tsp of dried rosemary

Heaped tbsp of honey

2 tbsps of worchestershire sauce

2 tins of tomatoes (Mutti FTW!)

2 tins of cannellini or butter or black beans, drained

Salt and pepper

TO SERVE

Slices of sourdough, toasted and buttered

Poached or fried eggs

Avocado, diced (optional)

Torn buffalo mozzarella (also optional)

Chopped flat leaf parsley or chives

THE PLAN

Add the glug of oil to a large pan and fry off the chopped onion for about five minutes until beginning to soften. Add in the bacon and chorizo and stir fry for another five minutes until crisping.

Add in the cumin, rosemary and oregano. Stir fry for 30 seconds and then dump in the tomatoes, honey and wuster. Give it a good grinding of black pepper and a pinch of salt and bring to a simmer. Let it bubble away, stirring from time to time until beginning to thicken – about ten minutes. Add in the beans and give it another five minutes.

Check the seasoning and then it’s ready to serve. It may also need another drip of honey.

There’s no rules to this but I usually serve with whatever I have heaped onto the buttered sourdough toast.

To be perfectly honest, mine wasn’t as good as the Shells Café version but then again, I wasn’t up all night foundering my rear end off before eating.