Americans Reveal Their Ideal Breakfast Plate, and It Includes Scrambled Eggs
Breakfast food can spark quite a bit of debate, because pretty much everyone has their own idea of what the best breakfast plate looks like. Some like their toast darkly toasted rather than light, some people prefer chewy bacon over crispy, and others absolutely must have their eggs sunny side up. Then there’s coffee; do you add a lot of milk or cream, just a dribble, or none (or are you among the 19% of Americans who don’t drink coffee at all? An impossible feat for many of us). YouGov recently conducted a survey to find out which breakfast preferences reign supreme in America, including how crispy we like our bacon and how dark we want our toast. Combining the most popular choices together, they created Americans’ perfect breakfast plate.
YouGov surveyed 1,295 adults across the United States and asked them to either choose a picture that most closely matched their preferences for a few breakfast items (in the case of coffee and toast), or to choose the written description that best matched how they like their bacon and eggs. Starting with coffee, most people responded that they like adding at least some milk when they make coffee. The majority, 39%, add enough milk to make the coffee a light tan color, and 21% prefer simple, black coffee. We might need to have a chat with the 11% of people who like adding so much milk that their coffee is almost white, though.
Participants were also shown pictures of toast and asked to choose the picture that most closely matched their preferred level of toasting. Shockingly, 1% of respondents said they prefer to have burnt toast at breakfast time. The most popular choice was clear though, and it’s somewhere in the middle—58% of people want their bread somewhat lightly toasted, with somewhat darkly toasted coming in second place with 28%.
To pick the most popular bacon doneness, YouGov asked participants to choose the description that most closely matched their preferences. And Americans are experts, since 93% believe a real hearty breakfast needs to include bacon. Crispy is clearly the way to go—most people choose somewhat crispy with 37%, but very crispy was a close second with 34%. Sorry chewy bacon lovers, you’re in the minority with just 4% preferring bacon very chewy, and 16% of participants wanting it somewhat chewy.
That brings us to one of the most controversial decisions: How we like our eggs. Scrambled eggs were the clear winner here since they were the top choice for 36% of respondents. Over easy came in second, followed by sunny side up and over medium, with hard-boiled landing in last with just 6%.
If you combine all of the first place winners into one meal, you’ll end up with America’s ideal breakfast plate. It consists of somewhat lightly toasted bread, somewhat crispy bacon, scrambled eggs, and served with a cup of coffee with milk, very light tan. We’d be pretty happy to wake up to this meal in the morning!
Even if your breakfast favorites don’t quite match up with the majority of America, there’s no wrong way to eat breakfast (or brunch, for that matter). We love it so much we even support having breakfast for dinner. Still, it’s always interesting to see what other people love to eat in the morning, and it might even come in handy, especially the next time you host brunch.
