Hot Tea & Toast equals Warm Memories

I haven't made toast for myself in a long time and I'm wondering why now. I've always considered it a comfort food...warm bread, melting butter, thin layer of my favorite jam or jelly.

This morning's meal reminded me of breakfasts long ago at my Oma & Opa's house. Such clear memories, warm memories. Their kitchen always smelled of a combination of tea and my Opa's tobacco smoke. The wallpaper had cherries on an off white background, the counters green and the chairs red. The clock above the door was always set ahead (my Opa's doing because my Oma was always running late) and the back window looked out over their small yard and my Oma's rose garden.

Breakfast was always the same: hot tea, toast, sweet butter, current jelly or strawberry jam and a soft boiled egg served in an eggcup for my Opa. Once in awhile, my Opa would walk down the hill to the corner bakery and buy warm, homemade jelly donuts, the kind that were coated with sugar and filled with raspberry jelly! I would squeeze in my seat, butter my toast and watch my grandparents' morning ritual. There was an order to it and never rushed.

My memories of eating breakfast there are sort of a comfort food. A comfort of a time when there was a ritual I could always count on being there, a warm belly, comforting smells and being loved in their own special way.