TASTES THAT BIND

Sam Woulidge shares her delicious trick to a quick sit-down weekday family breakfast

Ourweekend breakfasts are leisurely, decadent affairs. Food market splurges that last way past lunchtime, or freshly baked bacon-and-cheese croissants from Jason Bakery, or warm almond croissants and creamy flat whites and hot chocolate from Giovanni’s after a cold swim at Clifton. As a family of three, these breakfast indulgences are our weekly reminder of how lucky we are. We are grateful for the life we have and the lives we share.

Weekday breakfasts, on the other hand, are rushed, often shouty experiences.

Try as we might, we never manage to sit down at a table together and calmly prepare ourselves for the day ahead.

There are occasional warm, fuzzy family moments when we drink tea in bed in the morning for a few minutes before the hysteria kicks in. But mostly the hysteria just kicks in.

When it comes to breakfast, I’m content with coffee. Or a green juice if I’m feeling particularly virtuous. If I can’t eat sugary carbs as I do on weekends, I’d rather go without. Jacques eats a wonderful homemade granola that he makes on Sunday nights. In an ideal world, Seb would join his father in eating double-thick yoghurt, crunchy granola and a swish of honey.

But no. We don’t live in an ideal world.

And our son has taken a dislike to the texture of granola. Texture? No one warned me about this. Seb likes soft things for breakfast. He eats scrambled eggs with Parmesan shavings; sweet, softened milky Weet-Bix; soggy, sugary Rice Krispies.

The last two fill me with guilt…

So, on good days – those days when we have all managed to wake up a bit earlier than usual and the school lunchbox is packed with healthy treats and Jacques and I can do more than gulp down our coffees and grunt at one another – I make puffy cheese toasties. Just the way my mother did. With shortcuts and affection. Puffy cheese is similar to Welsh rarebit I suppose, or a croque monsieur, but without the fuss and the ham. Grated cheese, eggs and a dollop of mayonnaise (I grew up in the seventies after all) slathered on slices of bread and popped under the grill for a few minutes until it’s all puffed up and warm and soft inside. Kind of like you feel when you eat it.

Other than the mayonnaise, puffy cheese ticks all the boxes that should be ticked to ensure that a small boy has had a sensible breakfast. But, more importantly, it’s a treat. A nutritious (and yes, calorific) treat, but the fact that I’ve gone to the trouble of making puffy cheese feeds the hearts of those I love.

Together we sit in the courtyard, enjoying the early morning sun, drinking from a fresh pot of hot tea and eating warm toasted cheese before we take on the day. Making provision for an additional 20 minutes in the morning for breakfast is all that is required to centre ourselves by focussing on one another. Eating puffy cheese toasties together in the morning is the culinary equivalent of the group hug that Seb loves so much.

My in-laws came to stay recently.

They are familiar with our early morning weekday shouting shenanigans, but on that particular Tuesday I decided to get up a bit earlier and make puffy cheese toasties so that we could all eat together before everyone went their separate ways. “Aunty Phumla!” Seb shouted when our helper and friend arrived for work. While making her some coffee and putting the bread in the toaster, and mixing the grated cheese and egg, I noticed

Phumla laughing at me. “What?” I asked defensively. “Vroeg opstaan. Kos maak.

Goeie makoti.” (Wake up early. Make food. Good daughter-in-law.) She teased me affectionately, referencing her own Xhosa cultural traditions and the effort a new bride goes to in order to impress her in-laws. I laughed. Puffy cheese toasties and laughter. And family and a friend.

That was a very good Tuesday morning.

Eating puffy cheese toasties together in the morning is the culinary equivalent of the group hug that Seb loves so much”