15 Christmas Day Breakfast Recipes Worth Waking Up For

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15 Christmas Day Breakfast Recipes Worth Waking Up For

Even better than opening presents.

Christmas morning means different things to different people. Some will wake up and open gifts with their well-adjusted siblings, others will take advantage of the zombie-film-quiet in their city and go for a meditative walk, some will stay in bed, while others will be nervously cleaning up in anticipation of their white squall of a family rolling through.

But regardless of what Christmas means for you, you’re going to have to eat at some point and you might as well make it festive. Between the booze, bread, and bacon recipes here, there's something for every vibe.

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First thing’s first: it’s time to steady the ship and warm up with hot booze. Dust off the rum bottles and make this eggnog cocktail that smells like the Christmas of your childhood but feels like a grown-up good time. You really can’t go wrong with two kinds of rum and emulsified eggs in the morning.

Nothing says “Wake the fuck up!” quite like a couple of perfectly executed sunnyside-up eggs in your plate staring right back at you. Most people can fry an egg, but there is a right way to do it and it takes time. What better way to see if you’ve actually disconnected from the stress of your job than by waiting five minutes for an egg? It's a holiday meditation of sorts.

If you want to maximize the softness of your morning biscuits, there’s only one way to do it and that’s with lard. A little heavy cream and buttermilk don’t hurt either, and these biscuits are perfect vessels for the homemade holiday jams that family members are so keen to hand out.

The unsung hero of the root vegetable family is the parsnip and there’s no better time to celebrate winter’s bounty than on Christmas morning with a waffle made from potatoes and parsnip. Once constructed, you can decorate your hash waffle like a Christmas tree, with red tomatoes and green avocados to really maximize the holiday symbolism.

Let the pecorino snow down on your eggs, cured pork cheeks, and onions in a cheesy, eggy frittata that puts a breakfast spin on a Roman pasta classic. The more it looks like a sheep’s milk cheese blizzard hit this dish, the better.

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Santa Claus—or your roommate—would really appreciate a few white chocolate chip cookies laced with bourbon eggnog being left out for them on Christmas Eve. If they both ghost, then it’s cookies for breakfast!

There is enough cream and cheese curds to create an entire winter wonderland in a skillet here. With andouille sausage, eggs, and buttered bread to scoop everything up, this recipe is an ideal breakfast if you’re not planning on eating for the rest of the day—or year.

If you’re already planning on frying up an English breakfast on Christmas morning, why not get liquored up with some gin and English Breakfast tea leaves. Ideally sipped on with pinky finger fully extended between ambitious bites of sausage and egg.

It’s not the holidays without a pie somewhere on the table and this Swiss chard pie with bacon is more than worthy of that status, even at the breakfast table.

Honey-infused butter and maple syrup never met a pancake they didn’t like and they both collide atop these insanely fluffy ricotta pancakes. Pancakes are an obvious Christmas morning crowd-pleaser, but the ricotta here will allow you to quietly break with tradition and repeat “Yes, the secret is the ricotta!” to astonished family members.

This is about as easy as it gets for breakfast. Throw some white bread, maple syrup, eggs, and cream cheese together overnight and the next day you’ve got oven-ready French toast. No egg-dipping or frying pan craziness to deal with as you hustle to wrap those last minute gifts.

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Homemade Gravlax Recipe

Gravlax is one of the easiest things to make at home and one of the easiest to infuse with a little holiday herb. Depending on your guests’ narc levels, you can cure this salmon with either normal vodka or weed-infused vodka. Grandma’s vibe at the breakfast table will vary significantly depending on which route you decide to take at the curing stage.

Cinnamon buns are already pretty much the perfect winter breakfast food, but ginger, nutmeg, cloves, and allspice will make them even more Christmassy and fill your kitchen with very positive energy. This recipe goes into the "crawl back to bed" category of Christmas breakfasts.

If you need to tranquilize your antsy family with a tactile distraction, then look no further than monkey bread. It’s got the big, gooey tastes and textures that you want on Christmas morning, but the bread-tearing is a great diversion for critical guests prone to fixating on your personal life or already asking when dinner will be ready.

It’s always a good time for churros and Christmas is, of course, no exception. Heck, you can even shape these Michelin-level churros like candy canes and coat them in powdered sugar if you want. It’s Christmas, damn it, and you can make a lot of people, including yourself, happy with churros.