Good morning Mr. Breakfast!!

When the weekend comes and you've just slept in till after 10, it's the best time to make the ideal breakfast. You'd think our lovely city of Seattle would be full of excellent diners... but it's totally not!! I think it's best to cook your morning favorites at home and try to outdo yourself now and then. You may have had one beverage too many the night before on a given occasion, but this breakfast is easy enough to make and definitely good for the soul if not for the body. If you don't try it, you're missing out! Serves 2.

Cheddar-chive scones with scrambled egg, sausage gravy and bacon.

I learned this outstanding scone recipe when I used to be the prep and pastry cook at Fuel Cafe, one of Denver's favorite fine restaurants. I can post sweet variations, which were what I usually made there, some other time!

Heat the oven to 350*.

First, fry two strips of bacon in a medium saute pan till nice and crispy. Take them out to drain them and crumble them up when they're cool enough. Leave at least some of the bacon fat in the pan so you can use it in a little while. Now you're about to have a few things to do at once. The scones need to be mixed and put into the oven next, so start here:

• Juice from 1/4 lemon
• Enough milk to make up 3/4 c. liquid when added to the juice

Combine these in a little bowl and set aside...unless you keep buttermilk in the fridge, which we personally don't, because it goes to waste unless we make scones every day. The lemon juice will thicken and curdle the milk and work just fine as a buttermilk sub! At this point, I beat

• 1 egg

...and pour just 1/2 of it into the makeshift buttermilk so I can stir it all together. Save the rest of the egg, so you can add more eggs to it for the scramble. Now it's time to get out

• 1 stick butter

Cut the stick of butter into little cubes and put it on a plate in the freezer for a couple minutes while you measure the following ingredients into your bowl (I use a Kitchenaid stand mixer with a paddle attachment, but an ordinary mixing bowl with a pastry blender and a spatula would be fine too):

• 2 cups flour

• 1 tbsp. sugar

• 1/2 tsp. baking soda

• 1 tsp. baking powder

• a good sized pinch of salt

• around 3 tbsp. of finely chopped chives

• up to a cup of coarsely grated fine cheddar (save some aside to sprinkle on top of the scones)

Get your mixer set up, turn it on Stir for a couple seconds to combine the bowl's contents, then drop in the cold butter cubes and leave it on the lowest speed until the butter combines with the dry ingredients to appear crumb-like. Then, pour in the mixture of buttermilk and egg. Allow the mixer to run just until all the dry parts are incorporated, then add a couple more tablespoons of flour if the dough looks just a little too soft (it usually does for me.)

Scrape the dough out onto a well-floured countertop and dust it with more flour. Pat the dough out to a little under 1" thick. You can make it into a round and cut it into 8 triangular wedges, or into a rectangle-ish shape and cut it into 8 square-ish shapes. Last time, I experimented with folding the dough back on itself twice before patting it into its final shape and thickness in order to make the scones more lofty and flaky. No matter what, though, work the dough as little as possible. If you get the gluten going, the scones will get hard and tough like Starbucks ones. Gross!

Place the dough pieces onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and brush the tops with milk. Sprinkle them with the rest of the cheese and put them into the oven. Check them after 15 minutes: if the tops are golden and spring back when you poke the biggest one, then they're done. It might take a couple more minutes too. Meanwhile...

To the bowl with the leftover half of a beaten egg, add 3 more eggs and a splash of water and beat well with a fork. Now start the gravy. In the pan with the little bit of bacon grease left in it, scoop out about 1/4 - 1/3 of a log of breakfast sausage and begin sauteing it and breaking it up into little chunks with a spatula. When it's cooked, add a few tablespoons of flour and stir that in well. Then pour in some milk, maybe just under a couple cups, and stir till combined, using the milk to deglaze the pan. Turn the heat to low, and continue to stir the gravy very frequently, adding salt, pepper and hot sauce. It will only take a few minutes to reduce and be ready to eat. If it starts to look like not-quite-enough gravy for two plates, you can add some more milk! Meanwhile...

Butter a small saute pan, heat it, and add the eggs. Scramble them as usual. By now the scones should be done, so put one (or two if you're starving) in each shallow bowl. Top each scone with half the eggs, then half the gravy, then one strip of crumbled bacon. Serve with more hot sauce!

You should have at least 4 scones left, so wrap them individually and save them for tomorrow. A couple minutes in a toaster oven will make them good as new the next day, and they're excellent on their own.  If you are making breakfast for several friends, just make a lot more gravy and scramby eggs, and use all the scones!

Whew. That was a lot to do, but take a bite. It was totally worth it, right? Enjoy!