Best. Breakfast. Ever.

On Saturday Hüsbando and I went to the big farmer's market in Berkeley around 11 – this is early for us but I was intent on getting to Fatted Calf, the charcuterie I had just read about it in Edible East Bay, before they sold out. By 11:30 they almost had, but we were able to score some delicious breakfast sausage (lightly spicy pork, from organic piggies, meant to ask which farm but the line was long) and some fennel sausage. Then we moseyed around looking for the Thai place, intending to get lunch, but they weren't there so we decided to get the ingredients for a fine breakfast and go back and cook it right away. Which we did. And oh my oh my, was it delicious.

We bought some eggs from a farmer I had never seen at the market before, B'n'B Organic Farm. The man assured me that these chickens were actually pastured, roaming around on 40 acres of grass. (Hüsbando was dubious, saying he thought the man was telling me what I wanted to hear. Further investigation required.) He had five or six kinds of eggs and I asked him which were the best. He pointed to some ones that were slightly green, like an Easter egg that didn't soak long enough. They were from South American chickens called Auracanas.

"I usually sell out of these, because the vendors buy them before anyone gets here," he told me. Well, that did it for me – I bought them. They were $5 per dozen, about $2 more than the Uncle Eddie's Cage Free I've been buying, which I recently discovered to my chagrin are from the massive Petaluma Farms chain that also makes Judy's and Rock Island. Of course, regular old eggs from battery hens are about 79 cents these days.

Next, we bought some olive bread from Phoenix Pastaficio in order to have a vehicle for the incredible butter I bought at last week's market from some tiny cheese-making dairy whose name I have temporarily forgotten. (I asked the woman whether the cows were pastured, and she said yes, that they didn't even have a barn.) At Hüsbando's request, we picked up some white button mushrooms that he would sauté in aforementioned butter along with some of the green garlic I had bought last week. The mushrooms were pesticide-free and chemical-free but not organic – the seller said for some reason the price would be prohibitive … but they were local. After a few more purchases – like these delicious salmon cakes I couldn't pass up -- we hungrily headed home to cook.

We decided to do a little comparison taste test with the B'n'B and Uncle Eddie's eggs: Pastoral vs. Big Organic, if you will. The green eggs were different in many ways: the shells felt thicker, and the membrane between the shell and egg was also tougher. The yolk was a brighter orange, and seemed sturdier, more protein-dense in my imagination. You can actually see the difference between them in the pan (maybe not in a picture this size, but they're on the right). Taste-wise, they were about the same. I couldn't really tell any difference…but I bet I could if I had some 79-cent Safeway eggs! (Also, on Sunday I made my first ever soufflé from 6 of the remaining green eggs, plus leftover breakfast sausage, aged Gouda, and cheddar from the little dairy. It stood tall and fluffily proud and, if I do say so myself, was one damn fine soufflé. I credit the eggs.)

The breakfast sausage from Fatted Calf was so far beyond any commercial sausage that I have ever had that it was almost like it was a whole different kind of meat. It was fatty and spicy and salty and oh, just carnivorously orgasmic. (Ketut lounged around hoping to get some, but we wouldn't share.) Hüsbando's mushrooms were excellent, too – meaty and buttery and far more mushroomy tasting than I was expecting from the white button kind. Rounded out with the fresh strawberries from the market a few days prior, it was just the most delicious breakfast I have ever had – at home or anywhere else. We took turns patting each other on the back in between bites.

One thing, though – we weren't sure whether it was simply that the food was so measurably better than supermarket food (I think it was) or whether the fun of "foraging" for it at the market had added a special flavor to the meal. Whatever the secret ingredient was, it was the most satisfying meal I've had in a long time.