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A lighter version of the full English

Angela Nilsen transforms the traditional breakfast making it lighter, yet still delicious. Photographs by Simon Wheeler

Reproduced from the April 08 issue of Good Food magazine on sale now. Subscribe now and save 30 per cent.

The challenge
Have you ever tucked into a full English breakfast, then felt racked with guilt? My aim was to reduce the guilt of eating what is ostensibly a plateful of fried everything, by creating a healthier, more contemporary version - while offering the same taste satisfaction as a traditional fry-up.

Seeking advice
'A traditional cooked English breakfast is not a problem, it's how often you eat it, so regard it as a treat,' Good Food's nutrition expert Fiona Hunter told me.

She advised choosing sausages with the highest meat content, and the least fat, salt and other more dubious ingredients. 'Have one really good sausage rather than two of uncertain quality. Bacon can be very fatty and salty, so choose a lean back bacon, trimmed of fat. Choose free range eggs, preferably omega-3 enriched, and if you must have fried bread, for more fibre choose wholegrain or wholemeal.'

Fiona then advised that I 'go big' on healthy ingredients. 'Mushrooms can count as one of your five-a-day and cooked tomatoes are a good source of lycopene. This meal does lack vitamin C, so serve it with fruit and juice.'

To reduce the fat, I knew I needed to eliminate the word 'fry' from the cooking equation. Since B&Bs serve this meal on a daily basis I spoke to Kit and Penny Noble, who run Nonsuch House in Dartmouth, to see how they coped. They advised using good-quality, local ingredients, cooking quick and to order, and using heavy non-stick or griddle pans that need the minimum of oil.

Testing times
I began by frying eggs in minimum oil and, to save basting in extra oil, covered them with a lid part way through. This worked beautifully, but wishing to eliminate all cooking fat, I decided to poach instead.

Poaching eggs has never been my forte and various cookbooks offered conflicting advice. So I reached for Elizabeth David's French Provincial Cooking (Penguin Books) and tried her poaching tip:

'First, dip each egg in a saucepan of boiling water while you count 30 seconds. This process coagulates a thin layer of white nearest the shell so when the egg is poached the rest of the white tends to fly about less than when the raw egg is put straight into the water.' Her advice was brilliant and the egg was fashionably shapely.

A fresh approach
Reluctant to lose the fried bread, I decided to make it healthier by brushing granary bread with a little olive oil then griddling it. To get the best from the sausages, it was more about buying wisely. I eliminated oil by grilling them, and as long as I kept turning them, they self-basted and remained juicy.

Grilling also worked best for the bacon and, by leaving on just a minimum of fat, it didn't get dry. After trying various tomato varieties, I loved the sweet juiciness of whole cherry tomatoes. For gutsy flavour and texture, brown portobello mushrooms won out, and grilling brought out their natural juiciness.

The verdict
For my final test there wasn't a greasy puddle in sight, and a glass of fruit juice and mix of fresh fruits balanced things out.

Nutritionist Dr Wendy Doyle had warned that this meal would never be superhealthy. What surprised me though, was how many merits this trimmer version had compared to a traditional fry-up (about which Wendy could find nothing good to say).

Fat was almost halved (which reduced the calories), salt was very slightly reduced, fibre was doubled and the meal was now a good source of calcium, folic acid, vitamin C and omega 3s, and counted as 4 of 5-a-day. I'll still regard this meal as an occasional treat, but at least I won't feel so guilty about it.

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