Something to Declare

Comedian and Travel Channel presenter Danny Robins is hungry for breakfast. Illustration: Spencer Wilson / Synergy Art

ONE OF THE FUNNIEST THINGS I HAVE EVER seen is my girlfriend’s Swedish father smearing a huge dollop of Marmite onto a croissant, thinking it was chocolate spread, then taking a bite. In case you think I should have stepped in to save his taste buds, I only realised it was Marmite when he let out a howl of pain and the croissant came flying back out at speed.

I still remember his hurt bemusement that something so obviously dangerously poisonous had been left out on the breakfast table.

If you’re anything like me, what you find on your plate in the morning can really set the tone for the day. But when you wake up in a foreign country, you know there’s just no guarantee that your idea of how to break-your-fast will be shared by the locals. After all, one man’s muesli is another man’s garlic sausage and smoked cheese on rye bread. Breakfast in Europe is a contentious issue. Forget a single currency or who should be EU President, the big question dividing the Continent is: sweet or savoury?

It seems to me the further south you travel, the sweeter breakfast gets. The French enjoy a petit déjeuner of croissants and jam, while their southerly neighbours the Spanish up the sugar levels with doughnut-like churros.

Head north though and such cavity-inducing treats are frowned upon by Germans and Scandinavians, who like to kick off their day with hard bread, cheese and ham – which strangely is also often what they have for lunch. Incidentally, the Swedish and Norwegian word for breakfast, “frukost”, actually means lunch in Danish, so it is entirely possible that breakfast in Scandinavia is one big linguistic confusion. That certainly seems to be the only way to explain the desire to have cold pickled herring touch your stomach first thing in the morning.

Personally, I kick off my day with garlic snails on toast and a glass of neat absinthe. Only kidding. That would make me dangerously mad. Or perhaps Belgian. No, I’m generally happy with a bowl of fruit, except if I’m abroad, when I become fiercely patriotic and absolutely insist on having a “full English” – preferably with bacon so greasy I get chest pains just looking at it. The author W Somerset Maugham once said: “The only way to eat well in England is to have breakfast three times a day.” Which is perhaps a little unfair, but at the same time a pretty good idea. Sausage, bacon and eggs for breakfast, lunch and dinner? Count me in. It beats a Marmite croissant any day.