Fried Eggs

There is just something about fried eggs. They stare down at us from those Denny's and Perkins' billboards along Route 22 in all their golden-yolked beauty. They are surrounded by pancakes, hash browns and sundry breakfast meats, but it is the fried eggs that catch our eye. The primitive part of our brain recognizes that golden, runny, warm, delicious yolk as jam-packed with pure protein.

Alas, the modern part of our brain screams, "Pure cholesterol! Have an egg white omelet if you've got to have eggs, but some nice tofu and oatmeal would be better for you. Don't you ever read the newspaper? It's full of heart-healthy recipes."

Until today, that is. Fried egg fans rejoiced to see the recipe for "Spaghetti with Fried Eggs and Cheese" featured along with the standard, disgustingly healthy "Thai Style Chicken Wraps with Mango Salsa", "Easy Gelatin Surprise", etc.

This is the real deal. While the pasta cooks, we fry up some garlic in oil, add the eggs, cook them until the whites are set and the yolks are runny, remove the eggs, dump the oil / garlic mix onto the pasta (can't waste any of those calories), toss the pasta with cheese and parsley, top each serving of pasta with an egg, and cut the yolk to allow all that golden goodness to create a veritable gut-busting, cholesterol-laden calorie bomb. Take that, Easy Gelatin Surprise!

It was hearty, he-man breakfasts like Spaghetti with Fried Eggs and Cheese that made America great. Lewis and Clark wouldn't have made it across the Rockies with an egg white omelet under their belt. It's about time the newspaper's Wednesday Food Section realized this.