Thanks for Breakfast, Mum

By age 16 I considered waking up at 6:30 for school to be sleeping in – thank you competitive swimming. I enjoyed my 6:30 wake up shout on the days before meets or when my dad felt sorry for me and gave up on forcing me to be up at 4:30 am for practice at 5. Mum (Gela for greater comic relief) enjoyed it too because it meant that our family breakfast would take place around our bar instead of in the parking lot of the YMCA or stadium pool.

                 She always made it quick, fun and vibrant with porridge, boiled eggs with garlic salt, toast, cantaloupe, watermelon, orange, and bananas. Mind you, I wasn’t the biggest fan of porridge (oats or cornmeal) until well into those teenage years; I guess it’s something about being an athlete that made you visualize the protein healing the muscles that got ripped apart by yesterday’s practice. Or, it could have been Gela’s reminder that you eat what is provided or go to school hungry. Regardless, I treasured those chlorine-free mornings.  

                My post-graduate budget allowed me to relive those once in a while and when I got in the mood for an egg my first instinct wasn’t to fry it or make an omelet, but, yes to boil it! So I sliced it and made into a sandwich and downed it with some peach tea. My cousin called me grandma for the entire day, but I thought, “What would Gela do?”  She would show the sandwich some love, and that is exactly what I did, as much as I could before going to work.

Egg & Red Pepper Sandwich (time: 5 minutes):

• 1 boiled egg – sliced into 8
• 8 julienne slices of red pepper
• 1 tsp Parmesan cheese  
• 1 pinch black pepper
• 1 pinch salt
• ¼ clove of garlic diced
• 1 pinches of dried parsley
• 2 slices of bread

Assembly (time: quick):

Lay all your ingredients on one slice of bread. Close the deal with the other slice.

For better handling, slice your sandwich in two or three – the pepper slices had their own agenda when I got down to business.

Hope you really are eating well,

Til lata,

Gillian M.