The Crispy Country Addition Johnny Cash Added To His Morning Eggs

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It's interesting to read anecdotes and stories about our favorite celebrities from the past, hoping to get a glimpse of how they lived and what they were like. If you've ever wondered what Johnny Cash had for breakfast, look no further. The country singer, who recorded iconic tunes such as "I Walk the Line" and "Hurt,"  loved music as well as old-school Southern food, and often started the day by putting a crispy twist on his eggs — fried bologna.

Cash had a specific way of cooking breakfast, as revealed by his son, John Carter Cash, in "The Cash and Carter Family Cookbook." He liked his bologna slices to be fried to a crisp, teetering on the edge of burned. Once he got his desired consistency, Cash would move on to the eggs. Like the bologna, Cash had a preferred method for frying eggs, too: half-scrambled and never beaten. Half-scrambled eggs, or country eggs as they are also known, involve letting the eggs partially set in the pan before being gently scrambled. The result is a scramble with chunky whites coated in creamy, sauce-like yolks.

The seasoning for Cash's bologna and eggs was a generous blast of pepper and a sprinkle of salt. The legendary singer scrambled his eggs in the same pan he fried his bologna in, to soak up all that savory flavor from the fat released by the meat. There was always ketchup on the table to squeeze over the crisp bologna and scrambled eggs. His go-to breakfast was eaten alongside fresh tomato slices and another Southern staple — baked biscuits, served with butter and honey.

Johnny Cash was big on Southern cooking, with a soft spot for homemade comfort foods. Everything from steaming hot portions of cornbread to spicy iron pot chili made regular appearances at the Cash residence, with Cash himself doing the cooking on some occasions. Whenever he made iron pot chili, Cash would let it slow-cook for hours on end, going by intuition and no specific measurements.

Fried chicken was another Southern staple Cash adored, even referencing it in his song, "Praise The Lord and Pass the Soup." He also loved meatloaf made by his mom, Carrie Cash. According to Cash's son, the country icon was known to enjoy crispy fried okra, deep-fried chicken skin, and fried catfish with crunchy coleslaw on the side.

To end his meals, Cash turned to classic, home-baked desserts, like peanut butter cookies and creamy pineapple pies. Cash's mom used to make both. While the singer loved jam cakes and pies in general, he had a particular fondness for fruitcake. For the Cash household, no time was more important than suppertime, when the family came together each evening to share a meal — regardless of whether it was iron pot chili, meatloaf, or fried chicken that graced the table that day.