I’m prompted to write this because I’ve got to think about my diet post stent. My cholesterol is a little high and I need to think about how I can reduce it and that means less fat in my diet. But at the same time I need good sources of protein and that’s where eggs come in.
Boiled eggs: these must be everyone’s first experience of eggs and they must rank amongst everyone’s favourites. For me they must be soft boiled, but that’s soft as meaning a runny yoke because the white must be cooked through, and they must be eaten standing up in an egg cup and with soldiers.
Some people say you should boil an egg for 3-4 minutes. Only f they’re very small eggs. Any self respecting large egg needs 6 minutes. Remember to pock a hole in the end to stop it cracking.
Fried eggs: you can’t ignore them but maybe they’re generally not the healthy option any more because of their association with guilty pleasures like bacon and fried bread. Too often you come across fried eggs on breakfast buffets where platoons of them slowly over-cook.
Fried eggs like boiled eggs need to be cooked so that the white is cooked through and the yolk reminds runny. The Americans ensure this by having them ‘easy over’ but really that shouldn’t be necessary. All it needs is that the egg should be well basted.
Poached eggs: I discovered, or maybe I just re-discovered, poached eggs on holiday last month at a hotel with one of those breakfast buffets. However they offered poached eggs to order and they came quickly and perfectly cooked (see the photo above). As an alternative to fried eggs they tick the important box of healthy preparation and they go perfectly with a slice of toast.
The purists would say that you should poach eggs by letting them float free in the boiling water. I’ll go with that. Eggs that are poached in some sort of device are just a little too industrial.
Scrambled eggs: good scrambled eggs are difficult to beat but they do demand some expertise in their cooking. They need to be served just sloppy and stirred to the last minute otherwise they come out as a failed omelette. Of course they’ll have been cooked with a knob of butter so they’re not the totally healthy option but they’re excellent with toast.
I eat scrambled eggs with toasted ciabatta every Saturday morning at Don Pasquale in Cambridge. They are consistently good.
Omelettes: when you’re on holiday and staying at a hotel with a breakfast chef on duty you’ve got the luxury of an omelette at breakfast. That’s a great start to the day and you’ve got the advantage of being able to exercise quality control by watching it being made. As with scrambled eggs an omelette should not be over cooked and remain sloppy inside.
There’s often an impressive array of ingredients to add to your omelette but these must be fresh, firm and flavoursome otherwise they’re a waste of time. And if you’re in Asia you’ll get the option of a little added chilli. Be careful!
You’ll note that I like my eggs on their own. The only exceptions I’ll make are the supporting toast, bacon and hash browns with a fried breakfast and the ingredients of an omelette. I see no point in adding an egg to an otherwise complete dish and certainly never add one when its yolk will mix with other fluids on the plate.
Thursday 15 Aug 19: It was a pretty standard day given that all my days are different anyway. I started with a photo session down in Orchard Park at 0830. Then a coffee at Thoroughbreads in Cowley Road before visiting Stagecoach with Orchard Park Community Council Chair Andrew Chan. I had lunch, an excellent fish & chips, at the Red Lion in Streatham with Lorna Dupre of the County Council Lib Dem group and then another photo session, we have political leaflet to publish, at 1500. 
Sometimes you get a mobile phone photo just right. And I reckon this is one of those times. It’s Ely cathedral of course taken from the garden of the Almonry.
This is one of those seasonal photos. During the summer growing season the farmers are out watering, fertilising and protecting their crops and they seem to do it at night time.
We spent 5 days in Wales in August of this year. It wasn’t planned as a big holiday but grew out of an idea to spend some time with the Bradburys (my daughter and her family) whilst they were camping in Anglesey. 
I lived in London for almost four years from September 1970. I lived in several flats, shared with a bunch of different people but all the time I worked for just one company, Royal Dutch Shell. They were formative years but I’ve got so say they were still a part of my growing up. I was still not the finished article. And rather surprisingly I don’t remember much about it. I had a camera and took photos but only occasionally so I don’t have much of a record of those days. 
I was in Manchester for a couple of days and this photo reflects what can be done with fine old buildings to repurpose them and with Lightroom to sort out the problem of ‘converging verticals’!