The First Fried Egg

This poem came about after I had been discussing the origins of drinking coffee with somebody. When you think about it, the process of picking berries from a bush, roasting them, grinding them into a powder and then pouring boiling water over the powder before throwing it away and drinking the liquid residue is really quite complicated, isn’t it? So how on earth did the first person to drink coffee ever come up with the idea – by a series of lucky accidents, or was it developed gradually over a number of years?


From my breakfast coffee to fried eggs was only a small step…
The First Fried Egg
Who first fried an egg?

What manner of man (or woman)

Initially cracked that delicate, yet tough

Ovoid shell, and dropped its

Glutinous, semi-transparent contents

Into sizzling hot cooking fat?

Who first decided that

The yolk’s glistening golden orb

Should sit, proudly supreme,

Surrounded by a virginal white cloud

Like the ochre late summer sun

In a pale September sky?

Was the first fried egg

Cooked sunny-side up?

Or flipped, over-easy? Basted? Or

Griddled crisp and brown,

Until all that glorious colour

Charred to a dull toast on both sides?

Was the first fried egg

Actually an accidental omelette?

Ignorantly or carelessly broken,

So that yellow and white

Mixed together haphazardly

And formed an ugly, uncharted map?

Who first discovered

The joys of a double yolk?

Those interlocking bright mustard spheres

Twice multiplying the sunshine

On your breakfast plate,

Like car headlights through a foggy dawn.

Who first fried an egg?

Was it some prehistoric cave dweller

On a scalding fireside rock?

Or an unknown, ancient chef de cuisine,

In search of nouvelle delights

For his trendy clientele?

Who first fried an egg?

What pioneer cook valiantly grappled

With that clinging, self-adhesive

Semi-liquid, as it stubbornly glued itself

To the surface of the pan

In those dark pre-Teflon times?

Who first fried an egg?

What culinary explorer took this secret fruit

And turned it into a breakfast delight?

Who discovered beneath that hard elliptic crust

Dwelt nature’s nutritious bounty?

And, more importantly, who ate it?!

Tony Beadle Copyright © 2005