Eggs

This morning it so happened that I had some rather splendid scrambled eggs for breakfast, leading to the thought that this was yet another of those things that the sort of hotels and restaurants we can afford to visit cannot manage anything like as well as we can manage at home. This despite scrambled eggs not being a difficult dish - although I suppose I ought to admit to having been making them for around 60 years now. I do have track record.

In this case, with part of perfection being the right blend of egg, for the perfect result, take one egg from Sainsbury's and one egg from Costcutter.

Pound some black pepper corns, preferably from a newly opened bag of same. Pound in the pestle and mortar originating from some endangered tropical rain forest and sourced by me at some car boot sale at Hook Road Arena. Maybe some of the aroma of the wood seeps into the pepper, rather as it does with oak matured Bourbon. Or at least that is what they say in the advertisement hoardings on the platforms at Oxford Circus southbound.

Add a little semi-skimmed milk to the eggs.

Sprinkle the pepper on top, taking care not to drop dollops, which are apt to clump.

Stir gently with a fork, to the point where the mixture is smooth, but not to the point of homogeneity.

Meanwhile, some butter has been heating gently in a saucepan. Add the mixture to the saucepan, replace lid. Cook slowly, stirring occasionally. Again, not to the point of homogeneity.

Turn onto a couple of slices of my own brown bread, cut about half an inch thick.

Perfection indeed.

And with breakfast finished off with an orange from Sainsbury's, also perfection. Unlike those from last week which, although from the same part of the shop and at the same price, were not very good at all. We find it very hard to tell from the outside and there seems to be a lot of variation from week to week. Not like the blending of eggs or the blending of flour at all. Never mind that of whisky.

PS: on this occasion I got a much better result with the flash on than with it off - when the pestle and mortar became a rather uniform slab of dark brown. Note also the Beryl Ware on the window sill. Still going strong here at home, although not turning up at car boot sales and charity shops quite as much as it used to.