Remix.run Logo
The Hunt for Dark Breakfast(moultano.wordpress.com)
186 points by moultano 5 hours ago | 70 comments
haritha-j 18 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Please allow me to introuce you to the sri lankan egg hopper (https://www.lavenderandlovage.com/2016/05/sri-lankan-egg-hop...) which lives squarely in the aforementioned dark abyss.

opan 16 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Going against the spirit of TFA here, but I believe you can eat anything at any time of day, and my favorite breakfast tends to be regular food. Chili, soup, pasta, baked potatoes. Something warm, filling, and usually involving salt. I do sometimes have something more traditional, like oatmeal, but it's not as satisfying. I also sometimes have oatmeal as my final meal of the day if I'm hungry but already a bit tired, as it's more calm than something like spicy chili.

hilliardfarmer 15 minutes ago | parent [-]

That is not what we are talking about.

Also, amazing article, haven't laughed that hard all day!

JackFr 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This article doesn't do it justice, but the Womelette at the short-lived Royal Canadian Pancake House in NYC lived in the dark abyss.

https://www.eater.com/2015/1/26/7860903/amanda-cohen-royal-c...

It wasn't just an omelette on top of a waffle (and both of them the size of a medium pizza). As you strayed from the edges toward the center it became difficult to see where the waffle ended and the omelette began.

Such a shame they went out of business.

mikestorrent an hour ago | parent [-]

This is fantastic, I'm dying to eat a Womelette.

muzani 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

In Malaysia, a common breakfast is roti telur + teh tarik which is close to the dark breakfast region. It's like paratha, with an egg, and milk tea.

It is difficult to put milk into food. Why not just drink it? Alternatively, can we drink eggs and flour?

Cheese is another variation for milk. What about grilled cheese and eggs? Or some variation on Mac and Cheese?

You can also consider other dimensions like vegetables and spices. According to this plane, shakshuka is pure egg. Add spices to milk and you have chai. Add eggs to chai and you have cursed eggnog.

bathtub365 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

There is prior art in the grilled cheese and eggs area: Denny’s Moons Over My Hammy.

psini 24 minutes ago | parent [-]

For a continental vibe see the french "Croque Madame"

darth_avocado 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Egg paratha is a common Indian dish. The dough can be made with flour and water, but is traditionally made with flour and milk.

https://www.thedeliciouscrescent.com/omelette-stuffed-parath...

jnaina 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Roti Telur is basically Egg Paratha. Indian migrants brought Paratha to Malaysia and Singapore, and it underwent some "localization" to suit the local palate, including being drenched in palm oil as it is cooked on the flat griddle. Sure fire way to clog your arteries, if eaten on a daily basis.

vasco 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

We can certainly drink eggs, Rocky had a few in the morning before he went to punch hanging frozen meat.

noduerme 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Haha. I'd suggest that what's missing in the um "latent space" here, is that the triangle should be a pentagon involving some form of bacon/sausage, and some form of potato.

This cracked me up, because I had a fantastic dream the other night where I had a tour through a donut factory. But the best thing I had (in the dream) was something I'd never tried before, never seen, and which I intend to make at the earliest opportunity. It was slightly salty french fries, buttered and coated in sugar and cinnamon, like cinnamon toast. Bang on. Makes a lot of sense too, if you think about it. Definitely would fit in the "dark breakfast" polygon.

[edit] the potato and bacon theory also comes from what ends up deliciously mixed on your plate at the end, which along with syrup and ketchup is also an integral part of any egg/flour/milk breakfast.

kfarr 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Yeah meat is another dimension, as is potato. So we're up to 4 dimensional breakfast latent space. I hate to think what's in the dark breakfast black hole of that 4 dimensional latent space...

noduerme 3 hours ago | parent [-]

I feel like there's a lot of unexplored area in the carb-soaked-in-egg category that French Toast fits into. The major analogues being chiliqiles and matzoh brie. I recently did something like french toast bites where I cubed some sourdough bread, soaked it with egg and fried it up with small pieces of bacon mixed in. But what if you did that with a glazed donut? Or a waffle?

[edit] just also why this post touched my heart - I think form is as important as ingredients whenever you're dealing with relatively few ingredients. I have a breakfast I particularly love making that's just hash browns, egg and cheese. But the trick is, you griddle the hash browns, then flip them and smash them on griddled cheese, then crack an egg on top while the cheese fries and flip the whole thing again. The result is a crispy potato pancake where one side is fried cheese and the other is embedded fried egg. The same 3 ingredients, but it can be held in hand and it's got the perfect balance in each bite.

ccppurcell 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Someone else may have said this but strictly speaking breakfast is something like a cone in a vector space, unless you want to explain to me how to eat negative eggs.

asdff 9 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Easy. Start eating two eggs a day. Then one day, eat three eggs taking the extra egg from tomorrows two spare eggs left in the carton.

graypegg 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Chicken maybe? It would represent an egg that did exist, but now doesn't.

1659447091 an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Now I want some chicken & waffles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_and_waffles

TeMPOraL an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Also, in the other direction in space time, it's an egg that could have been, but now won't.

nortlov an hour ago | parent [-]

Schrödinger’s egg?

TeMPOraL an hour ago | parent [-]

More like Minkowski's egg in this case.

porphyra an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Maybe the axes are actually logarithmic so 0 is 1 egg, 1 is e eggs, -1 is 1/e eggs, etc.

asdff 7 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Egg scramble fluffed with milk plus slice of toast might qualify

abakker 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If you add baking powder and butter, that dark breakfast recipe is very close to crepes.

My crepe recipe - cook on medium heat pan:

Blend on low: 4 eggs- 3/4 cup whole milk, 1/2 stick of melted butter, and 1/4cup to 1/2 cup plain flower, 1 heaped tbsp of baking powder, 1/2 tsp salt, vanilla optional and to taste

josephjeon 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Looks like very close to the dark breakfast recipe

Nursie 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Interesting, we could add in an 'arm' from the pancake local group, heading out from American pancakes, via traditional English pancakes (approx 1 cup of whole milk, 2 eggs, 3/4 cup of flour) to Crepes.

I guess the only difficulty there is we English don't eat those for breakfast, and really only make them on one day of the year. Which I missed this year!

Dammit, we're going to be having a belated pancake day here soon...

ai-christianson 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The concept of a 'Dark Breakfast Abyss' in the Breakfast Simplex is hilarious, but it got me thinking—maybe the reason we lack foods in that specific ratio of milk, flour, and eggs isn't because they'd destroy the world, but because they simply don't cook well conceptually. Like, an overly-battered omelette just turns into a gummy mess, not a crepe. It's fascinating how our culinary traditions naturally naturally sort themselves into these distinct mathematical vertices over centuries of trial and error.

bbminner 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Eastern European pan-fried cottage cheese fritters (mix and fry 150g cottage cheese, 5 tbsp flour, 1 egg, 3 tbsp sugar, salt) are great. That's all I have to say.

01100011 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The recipe at the end sounds a lot like the crepes I'd make in college. It was pre-WWW and I had no idea what I was doing but it seemed to work. The one thing I had going for me in college was a Costco membership. 25lb bags of flour, gallons of milk, and flats of eggs.. all cheap. I'd barter with roommates for crepe toppings (sour cream and jelly usually).

pbnjay 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I feel like excluding French toast is a serious faux pas here!

Breakfast burritos are also at least as important as quiche (as in, neither are as tasty without addins - just like omelettes).

moron4hire 4 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

As a certified expert breakfast cook, I bristle at the idea that scrambled eggs includes any ingredient other than eggs or seasoning.

kazinator 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Love how at at the milk apex, there is cafe latte. Of course, it couldn't just be milk, perish the thought!

kasitmp 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Salzburger Nockerln seems to fit in that area. https://www.austria.info/en-gb/recipes/salzburger-nockerl/

kibwen 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I suggest that the forbidden breakfast is tantamount to an eggs benedict, but with the hollandaise sauce replaced by a roux.

kazinator 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

If it's forbidden, it is rather "eggs interdict".

kijin 3 hours ago | parent [-]

The eggs had better be deviled, too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deviled_egg

koolba 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

So eggs with white gravy? I think I’ve had that combo and it was pretty banging.

Bjartr 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

How about a Sauce Mornay?

béchamel (roux + milk) + egg yolks + cheese

noduerme 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Add crawfish and you're really talkin

3RTB297 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Even easier - egg sandwich using a basic milk bread.

pxtail an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This whole thing is simply missing all milk based diary products like cheese, yogurt, white cheese, etc. When that is included then there is no gap or any mysterious quadrant.

theoa an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Posts like this are why I read Hacker News.

My Egg McMuffin will never look the same!

talldan 40 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A Japanese Souffle Pancake might be in the Dark Breakfast realm.

cadamsdotcom 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What sort of projection is this that turns a 3-dimensional space into a triangle!

Fancy projection math is only for after coffee!

jonahx 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplex

Common for visualizing mixtures of three things!

vl 2 hours ago | parent [-]

While you are technically correct, since any triangle is a simplex, this is not relevant to this visualization.

For this visualization: get positive quantities in 3D space, normalize to 1, now you have dot on a triangle on 1-sphere in a positive octant. Project triangle into 2D space a this is your visualization.

Paracompact an hour ago | parent [-]

2-sphere, I believe you mean to say.

moultano 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It's easy, if you normalize it so that it sums to one, it drops a dimension, and becomes an equilateral triangle.

xg15 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is amazing - and somehow channels both Douglas Adams and Randall Munroe at the same time...

p0w3n3d 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What about eggs eggs and milk breakfast? (Omelette with cheese). Plenty of protein and little sugar

reedf1 40 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The ones who walk away from omelettes.

aggakake 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Aggakake or oeuf au lait.

3 eggs, 2 cups milk, 1 cup flour. Makes a nice flan/pudding consistency. Eggy and delicious.

moultano 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Aggakake is on the chart!

fyltr 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Might choux hit that dark breakfast abyss? They aren't breakfast per se, but it might show that you can do things with those proportions.

medi8r 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Breakfast is just generally milquetoast then?

hspeiser 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What about french toast? I feel like there is a lot of egg in it, might place it near the bottom of the abyss.

moultano 4 hours ago | parent [-]

French toast isn't plotted because the recipe doesn't customarily start with flour, but if you do plot it it ends up in the lower middle. If you have exceptionally eggy challah, then you might be able to push it into the abyss, but really exceptionally eggy, like 1:1 egg to flour by weight.

aichen_tools 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is the kind of creative thinking that makes HN great. Using the framework of dark matter detection to explore unobserved breakfast possibilities is both hilarious and oddly rigorous. The breakfast phase space is clearly under-explored.

josephjeon 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Isn't it something like pancake with more eggs?

muzani 4 hours ago | parent [-]

The real question is why this isn't already a dish.

petesergeant 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I love the idea and the writing, but the execution seems off. Cake has a very well-defined spot and Weetabix doesn’t? More work needed

jfengel 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Congratulations. You've reinvented the souffle.

zem 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

french toast was dismissed far too lightly, it's exactly what goes into the gap. also savoury bread pudding.

csmantle 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This reminded me of <https://xkcd.com/2893/>.

purplezooey 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

No mention of Eggs Florentine?

d--b an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

maybe Portugal’s Pastel de Nata falls in the dark zone?

It’s a baked custard (so plenty of eggs) in a pie.

not sure the proportions match.

jacknews 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I usually have egg on toast with plenty of butter. The combination sits squarely in the dark region I think.

I also get up early and it is often actually dark.

dheera 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

What about vegetable-forward breakfasts? Completely not on this chart.

bigstrat2003 4 hours ago | parent [-]

That's because such breakfasts are forbidden by the Geneva Convention articles, section 23, subsection 8, paragraph 4. It's not one of the more well known provisions, but it does exist, and nobody wants to break international law.

lucianbr 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> nobody wants to break international law

I was with you up to this point, but my suspension of disbelief has its limits.