We're talking bacon, we're talking, sausage; we're talking eggs, hash browns, fried bread, black pudding (for the hard-core meat-o-philes); beans, toast, sugary tea, tomato (one of your 5-a-day)... and if you're damn lucky - there'll be two portions of all of this.
Be it hangover, the prospect of a hard day or emotional malaise... there are very few ills that this culinary interfusion won't cure. (Clinical obesity, notwithstanding.) So grab yourself a red-top tabloid and clear an hour in your schedule... things are gonna get greasy.
Chow-down on London's best fry-ups
Their fry-up for two is a heart attack waiting to happen for some, a rewarding feast for others. With bacon, sausages, short rib bubble and squeak, black pudding, trotter baked beans, bone marrow, mushrooms, eggs and unlimited toast, you certainly won't leave hungry.
Roast in Borough Market prides itself on its British menu and ingredients; their fry-up has their own recipe sausages and bacon and black pudding of the highest quality. It's also very picturesque, housed in the beautiful Floral Hall which overlooks the market.
Word got out long ago about the hearty fry-ups at this Columbia Road caff, so there are queues to get in on Saturdays (it's closed on Sundays). It's easy to see why, breakfast is well-priced and the staff are disarmingly friendly.
Tucked out of the way in Hackney Downs, Mess Café has cultivated a reputation for fine quality breakfasts at bargain prices. A full English (with tea!) for around the five-pound mark? How often do you see that aside from the traditional greasy spoon? Not often we’d wager and so Mess Café we salute you.
A menu teaming with excellence and easily the most upmarket place on the list, Caravan is an Exmouth Market gem. The fried breakfast uses ingredients that focus on taste and quality rather than the traditional approach to the English breakfast. Double the price of most greasy spoons but perfect if you’re taking a non-fan of bacon and eggs. Think sour dough rather than wafer thin white bread and delicate trimmings that take your fry-up to the next level.
The Garrison is first of all a pub, but it sure serves up an almighty breakfast. The difference between the fry up served here as opposed to a caf’, is immeasurable. For an English breakfast that makes you feel good about yourself is a rare thing, but a thing that The Garrison have succeeded in creating. Their ‘full and proper breakfast’ is a dish that transcends the restraints of a fry-up with its use of quality ingredients across the board.
Saturday detention never tasted so good! Welcoming of ‘athletes’, ‘princesses’, ‘basket cases’, ‘criminals’, ‘geeks’ and any other American high school labels prevalent in the movies of the late, great John Hughes. Yes, it has a catchy name but the menu can back it. The meat in the fry up is the real winner and if you’re afraid of the full English then there’s a whole host of American brunches to consider.
Nowhere else in London do you get to witness the origins of what’s on your plate at such close hand. Located within Hackney City Farm, Frizzante may not be sourcing its sausages and bacon from the yard out back, but there’s definitely <i>something</i> edgy about eating round the corner from two of the largest Tamworth pigs you’ll ever see. Its line-up of organic farm produce provides one of the tastiest, faux-healthy, fry-ups you can find. Honourable mention goes to the Canadian breakfast and its homemade banana bread.
At over £10 for the full English, The Grazing Goat is surely stretching it, right? Well, yes, perhaps a little but this is a mighty good fried breakfast and since you’re devouring it in what is essentially a gastro pub in the middle of Marylebone, the price is bound to be high.
No frills breakfast dining in the heart of Brixton. The teas are hot and strong – a beefy builder’s tan, the service is swift and the taste of the combo is – if you’re into grand clichés – ‘to die for’. The all-dayer is the one to go for, (of course) it comes with everything and the toast is some of the best around – butter, butter and more butter, on mighty white bread.