Ingredients
The plate
- 4rashers dry-cured back bacon
- 4pork sausages (Cumberland or Lincolnshire, 85% pork)
- 2large free-range eggs
- 1x 400 g tin baked beans in tomato sauce
- 4chestnut mushrooms (120 g), halved
- 2tomatoes, halved across the equator
- 2 slicesblack pudding, 1.5 cm thick
- 2thick slices white bloomer bread
- 30 gbutter
- 1 tbspsunflower oil
- Salt and black pepper
To serve
- Brown sauce or tomato ketchup
- A large mug of strong builder’s tea with milk
Directions
- Heat the oven to 100°C (200°F) to hold everything as it comes off the hob. A full English is an exercise in timing, not cooking.
- Start the sausages in a cold, lightly oiled frying pan over medium-low heat and turn them every few minutes for 15–18 minutes until bronzed all over and firm. Low and slow stops the skins splitting.
- Add the mushrooms cut side down and the tomatoes cut side up, season both, and cook 8 minutes until the mushrooms are browned and the tomatoes are collapsing but still holding shape. Move to the oven.
- Fry the bacon in the same pan over medium-high heat, 2 minutes a side, until the fat is translucent and the edges frilled and crisp. Rest it on the tomatoes in the oven.
- Fry the black pudding in the bacon fat 2 minutes a side until it crusts and cracks slightly at the edges.
- Warm the beans gently in a small pan without boiling; they should be loose, not reduced.
- Fry the eggs in the same pan on a moderate heat, basting the tops with the fat for 2 minutes until the whites are just set and the yolks still liquid.
- Fry the bread in the remaining fat 1 minute a side, or toast and butter it, and plate everything at once with the beans kept to one side of the plate so they do not flood the bacon.
Technique
- One pan, in order, is the traditional method: everything cooks in the fat left by the thing before it, which is where the flavour comes from.
- Beans and egg yolks are the two wet elements. Cafes plate the beans against the rim or in a small pot precisely so the toast stays crisp.
- Black pudding, hash browns and fried bread are regionally variable; bacon, sausage and egg are the fixed core.
Substitutions
- No black pudding? Add a potato hash brown or bubble and squeak made from yesterday’s leftover potato and cabbage.
- Grill the bacon and sausages instead of frying for a lighter plate, which is what most British cafes do at volume.
Variations
- Ulster fry, with soda farl and potato bread on the plate.
- Full Scottish, with lorne square sausage, tattie scone and haggis.
- Full Welsh, with laverbread and cockles fried in the bacon fat.
History
A substantial cooked breakfast of eggs, bacon, sausage, baked beans, grilled tomato, mushroom and toast, whose core combination developed gradually through the 1800s among the Victorian upper and later middle classes, who had the means and household staff to prepare an elaborate morning meal, before spreading more broadly across British society over the following century. Its heartiness reflects, in part, a period agricultural and industrial working pattern in which a substantial morning meal was considered practical fuel for a long physical workday ahead. Regional and national variations exist across the British Isles, including differences in Scotland, Wales and Ireland, each adding or substituting specific local elements such as black pudding, laverbread or soda farls, without any single version being treated as more correct than the others within their own regions.
Frequently asked questions
What is Full English breakfast?
Full English breakfast is a breakfast from United Kingdom: eggs, bacon, sausages, beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, toast. A substantial cooked breakfast of eggs, bacon, sausage, baked beans, grilled tomato, mushroom and toast, whose core combination developed gradually through the 1800s among the Victorian upper and later middle classes, who had the means and household staff to prepare an elaborate morning meal, before spreading more broadly across British society over the following century. Its heartiness reflects, in part, a period agricultural and industrial working pattern in which a substantial morning meal was considered practical fuel for a long physical workday ahead. Regional and national variations exist across the British Isles, including differences in Scotland, Wales and Ireland, each adding or substituting specific local elements such as black pudding, laverbread or soda farls, without any single version being treated as more correct than the others within their own regions.
How long does Full English breakfast take to make?
Full English breakfast takes 10 min of preparation and 25 min of cooking. The recipe makes 2 servings. It is rated easy to make.
What can I substitute in Full English breakfast?
Yes, within limits. No black pudding? Add a potato hash brown or bubble and squeak made from yesterday’s leftover potato and cabbage. Grill the bacon and sausages instead of frying for a lighter plate, which is what most British cafes do at volume.
What is the most important thing to get right in Full English breakfast?
Fry the bread in the remaining fat 1 minute a side, or toast and butter it, and plate everything at once with the beans kept to one side of the plate so they do not flood the bacon.
