Breakfast Epiphanies

The covid lockdown varies in intensity from one state to another in the US, but New Jersey’s regimen has been and remains among the most restrictive. [Aside: I initially mistyped covid as corvid, which brought to mind enjoyably Hitchcock-ian images.] Restaurants and pubs have been shut for months. A few eateries with the space set up outdoor tables (often in the parking lot), but even at the height of summer NJ weather is unreliable. This September many mornings are about  50F (10 degrees C), which is great for outdoor activities but a bit brisk for a sit-down. I’ve passed on the experience. At long last indoor dining is returning, albeit only at a maximum 25% capacity. Many smaller eateries remain shuttered, but enough have opened their doors for me to breathe a sigh of relief – a masked sigh, of course. You see, I am a lousy cook. Oh, I can rise to the occasion on special dates such as Thanksgiving, but on a daily basis I simply don’t have the patience to sauté onions, mix sauces, chop peppers and all the other feats of kitchen chemistry that make a good meal instead of something plucked out of the microwave with the flavor and texture of a boiled sandal.

This is why, prior to 2020, it was my habit to go out for a meal most days at some reasonably priced establishment. (See my 2018 post Dinner and a Show: https://richardbellush.blogspot.com/2018/09/dinner-and-show.html.) Fortunately, NJ (“the diner capital of the world”) has a lot of them. Or did. How many have been put out of business permanently remains to be seen. Some restaurants throughout the spring and summer have had curbside pickup of take-out orders, and I was grateful for those. Pick-up of brisket and ribs from the nearby Minuteman Smokehouse rescued me from more than a few boiled sandals. Still, eating out of a bag, while better than eating out of a microwave, lacks a certain something – including just being out in the world and bantering with a wait staff who know your name. Online chatter is no substitute for (suitably distant) mask-to-mask interaction. On the contrary, virtual conversation is a recipe for misanthropy. 

So, last week I enjoyed my first “real” breakfast in months at one of my old haunts: country fried steak with eggs over easy, hash browns, and buttered rye toast. (And, yes, the server said, “Hi. Richard.”) The comfortably full feeling afterward was better and longer lasting than an opiate high – and without the nasty side effects. There is so much more to rediscover: corned beef hash, apple cinnamon pancakes with maple syrup and sausage, French toast, Taylor ham (an NJ thing), chili jalapeno omelets, and much more. Once I’ve revisited the breakfast menus there is the continent of lunch to re-explore.

In a harsh and problem-filled world in which each of us sits under a sword of Damocles, a tasty breakfast in a pleasant environment may seem a trivial matter – and it is. But if we don’t appreciate simple pleasures when we can get them, the depressing stuff will be all to life there is. Allowing that to happen no doubt accounts for the rise in alcohol sales during the pandemic. According to the trade magazine The Spirits Business, in August 2020 compared to August 2019 sales of all alcohol products in the US were up 18% with the largest rise in hard liquor: “Across the whisky category, American whiskey increased by 27.8% and Irish whiskey saw value sales rise 27.6%.” Better to enjoy blueberry waffles and a mug of coffee with endless refills.

Trout Fishing in America – Breakfast Blues