The eggs are local; the ham comes from Burger's Smokehouse. The ham was browned a little in butter and then the eggs were dropped in. The little specks of congealed ham juices on the egg whites show where I spooned the hot butter onto the them to cook them through. mi).ssing from the picture are the English muffins and the cup of coffee, and, of course, the smell of all that cooking, which is not to be believed.

I love this breakfast and that's a damned good thing, because at the moment we have country ham up the wazoo. I went online a few nights ago to place our usual modest offer at Burger's website, only to discover a special offer: buy one of their spiral-sliced, fully cooked half country hams and get a second half free. We took advantage of this offer without really thinking it through.

Or, to put it another way, deep down in my heart I didn't believe that even Southerners would glaze a real country ham and pass plate-filling slices of the thing around the Sunday dinner table. Real country ham is salty (liked chipped beef only sliced thicker) and pretty darn chewy besides. Surely these must be gentler, kinder, dare I say it...suburban hams? In a word: no. They were not. They were chewy and salty and are now crouching in our refrigerator, two hefty monsters. I see a lot of iced tea in my future....