Slow Cooker Full English Breakfast – Easy Overnight Method
I love a cooked full English breakfast, but I don’t particularly love standing in the kitchen first thing in the morning with sausages in one pan, bacon in another, beans on the hob and somebody asking when the toast will be ready!
This slow cooker cooked breakfast is a completely different way of doing it. You put everything into the slow cooker the night before, leave it cooking on LOW and wake up with most of breakfast already sorted.
The slightly strange-looking part is that you don’t just tip everything into the slow cooker together. The beans, tomatoes, mushrooms and eggs go into separate heatproof mugs in the middle, while the sausages and rolled-up bacon cook around the outside.
It might look a bit like you’ve played Tetris with your breakfast, but it means everything stays separate rather than waking up to one enormous sausage, egg and baked bean stew!
My quantities make enough for around 2–3 people, with six sausages, six rashers of bacon, baked beans, tomatoes, mushrooms and four eggs.
All you really need to do in the morning is make some toast, carefully get everything out of the slow cooker and decide who gets the last sausage.
What you need for a slow cooker full English breakfast
For 2–3 people, I use:
- 6 sausages
- 6 rashers of bacon
- 400g tin of chopped tomatoes
- 400g baked beans
- 100g mushrooms, chopped or sliced
- 4 eggs, beaten
- 30g butter
You’ll also need four heatproof mugs or small dishes that fit comfortably inside your slow cooker.
Before you start filling them, I’d actually put the empty mugs into the slow cooker and check they fit. It’s much less annoying than filling four mugs with breakfast and then discovering the fourth one won’t go in!
Can I change the ingredients?
Of course. A cooked breakfast is one of those meals where everyone seems to have very definite opinions about what belongs on the plate.
You can use whichever sausages and bacon you normally buy. Bacon medallions are fine if you prefer those, or use ordinary rashers.
For the tomatoes, I use a tin of chopped tomatoes, but tinned plum tomatoes would work too. If you prefer fresh tomatoes with your breakfast, I’d be more inclined to cook those separately rather than assume they’ll behave exactly like a mug of tinned tomatoes after eight hours.
You can use button mushrooms, chestnut mushrooms or ordinary closed-cup mushrooms. Chop or slice larger ones so they fit comfortably into the mug.
The butter goes into the eggs and mushrooms. My original article suggested replacing it with Frylight because this recipe was written when I was much more focused on Slimming World. These days I’d simply say use the butter if you want it, or leave it out if you know you prefer them without.
You could also use vegetarian sausages and bacon, although I’d follow the cooking instructions for the particular products you’re using rather than assuming every meat-free product will be happy cooking for eight hours.
How to make a full English breakfast in the slow cooker
Start by lightly greasing the inside of your slow cooker with a little oil or cooking spray.
Put the baked beans into one heatproof mug, the chopped tomatoes into another, the mushrooms into the third and the beaten eggs into the fourth. Season the eggs and tomatoes with a little pepper if you fancy it.
Add 15g butter to the mushrooms and the other 15g to the beaten eggs.
Put all four mugs into the middle of the slow cooker.
Arrange the sausages standing vertically around one side. Roll the bacon rashers up and stand those around the other side.
It sounds slightly bizarre when you write it down, but once you’ve got everything in there it makes perfect sense!
Put the lid on and cook for around 8–9 hours on LOW.
Try not to keep opening the lid to have a look. If you’re making this overnight that shouldn’t be too difficult unless you regularly get up at 3am to check on your sausages!
In the morning, check that the sausages and bacon are thoroughly cooked and the eggs are fully set.
Then carefully remove the mugs – they will be very hot, so use oven gloves rather than grabbing one while you’re still half asleep.
Get some toast on while you’re dishing everything up and breakfast is done.
Can I cook it on HIGH instead?
My original recipe also gives a cooking time of 3–4 hours on HIGH. If you’ve actually made it successfully that way, I’d keep that option.
For an overnight breakfast, though, LOW is obviously the useful method because nobody wants to get up at 4am to switch off the slow cooker.
Different slow cookers can run at slightly different temperatures, so the first time you make it I’d pay particular attention to how the eggs, bacon and sausages turn out.
Is it safe to cook breakfast overnight in a slow cooker?
The important thing is that the meat is thoroughly cooked before you eat it.
Your sausages and bacon should go into a properly functioning slow cooker and you should avoid repeatedly lifting the lid during cooking because that lets heat escape.
If you’re unsure whether the sausages are cooked, check them with a food thermometer rather than relying entirely on how they look.
I’d also follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your particular slow cooker, especially if you’re using heatproof mugs or dishes inside it.
What are the scrambled eggs like in the slow cooker?
I think the eggs are probably the part of this breakfast that people will be most curious about. They don’t come out exactly like scrambled eggs you’ve stood over a pan stirring, because obviously nobody is getting up every half an hour during the night to give them a stir!
The eggs cook and set in the mug, so expect them to be firmer than freshly made soft scrambled eggs. Give them a stir when you take them out and break them up before serving.
If you’re someone who is particularly fussy about scrambled eggs, you could always leave the eggs out of the slow cooker altogether. Making scrambled eggs in a pan in the morning doesn’t take long, and you’ve still saved yourself the hassle of cooking the sausages, bacon, beans, tomatoes and mushrooms separately.
Personally, I think that’s the nice thing about this idea. You don’t have to cook every single part of your usual breakfast this way for it to save you time.
Will the bacon and sausages brown in the slow cooker?
Don’t expect the same crispy finish you would get from frying or grilling bacon and sausages. A slow cooker cooks with moist heat, so although they cook, the outside won’t necessarily have that lovely browned finish some people want from a cooked breakfast.
If you prefer your bacon crispy or like plenty of colour on your sausages, you could pop them under the grill briefly before serving. Obviously that adds another job in the morning, but it’s still considerably easier than starting the whole breakfast from scratch.
If you’re quite happy with softer bacon, just serve it straight from the slow cooker.
Can I prepare this slow cooker breakfast the night before?
The whole point of this recipe is being able to get most of the work done before bed and have breakfast waiting in the morning.
That said, I wouldn’t assemble everything hours in advance and then leave raw sausages, bacon and eggs sitting in a switched-off slow cooker on the kitchen worktop. Get everything ready when you’re about to start cooking, switch the slow cooker on and then leave it to cook overnight.
You can certainly make life easier beforehand by chopping the mushrooms, getting the mugs out and checking that everything fits in your slow cooker.
How do I know the sausages are cooked?
Sausages need to be thoroughly cooked before you eat them, so don’t judge them purely by how brown they look on the outside.
The Food Standards Agency advises that sausages should be steaming hot all the way through with no pink or red in the centre. If you use a food thermometer, the FSA gives 70°C for two minutes as one safe time and temperature combination, with other equivalent combinations also listed in its guidance.
This is especially worth checking the first time you make the recipe because slow cookers can vary. Once you know how your particular slow cooker behaves after eight or nine hours on LOW, you’ll have a much better idea of what to expect.
Be careful with the mugs!
This sounds ridiculously obvious until you’re standing in the kitchen half asleep and instinctively reach into the slow cooker for a mug!
The mugs or dishes in the middle will be extremely hot. Use oven gloves to remove them and put them onto a heatproof surface rather than straight onto a table or worktop that could be damaged.
It’s also important to use mugs or small dishes that are suitable for heating and to check the instructions for your particular slow cooker if you’re unsure about using dishes inside it.
I would definitely do a dry run with the empty mugs before making this for the first time too. Four mugs that look as though they’ll fit can suddenly take up an astonishing amount of room when you actually try to arrange them!
What can I serve with a slow cooker cooked breakfast?
Toast is the obvious extra because you can pop it into the toaster while you’re getting everything out of the slow cooker.
You could also add hash browns or potato cakes if you want a really big breakfast, although I’d cook those separately so they’re nice and crisp.
Then there are all the important cooked-breakfast arguments: ketchup or brown sauce, tea or coffee, toast or fried bread. I can’t help you with those because every family seems to have its own rules!
You certainly don’t need to add anything, though. With sausages, bacon, eggs, beans, tomatoes and mushrooms already included, it’s a pretty substantial breakfast as it is.
Can I make a vegetarian slow cooker full English breakfast?
You could use vegetarian sausages and meat-free bacon instead, but I wouldn’t simply swap them into this recipe and assume the cooking time will be identical.
Different meat-free products have very different cooking instructions and some are much better suited to long cooking than others. Check the packaging of the products you’re using first.
Alternatively, make the beans, tomatoes, mushrooms and eggs in the slow cooker and cook your favourite vegetarian sausages separately in the morning.
As I’ve been vegetarian since I was about ten, that’s probably the way I’d do mine anyway. It also means I can cook meat sausages and bacon for the meat eaters without having my vegetarian sausages sitting amongst them.
A note about Slimming World
I originally wrote a lot of my recipes when Just Average Jen was much more focused on Slimming World, so the old version of this recipe talked quite a bit about Frylight, removing fat from bacon and choosing Syn-free or low-Syn sausages.
If you follow Slimming World now, I’d check the current values for the particular sausages, bacon and other ingredients you’re using rather than relying on old Syn information online. Products change, and the plan itself changes too.
Otherwise, choose the sausages and bacon you actually enjoy and make the breakfast work for you.
Is an overnight slow cooker breakfast worth making?
I think this one comes down to what you dislike most about making a cooked breakfast.
If your favourite part is crispy bacon and freshly scrambled eggs, cooking absolutely everything in the slow cooker probably isn’t going to replace your usual Sunday breakfast.
If, on the other hand, it’s the thought of juggling three frying pans at 8am that stops you making one, this is a really handy alternative.
You can also mix and match. Let the slow cooker deal with the things that take time, make your toast and eggs fresh if you prefer them that way, and you’ve still made breakfast considerably easier.
It would be particularly handy when you’ve got people staying over, on Christmas morning when you’ve got enough other things to think about, or before a busy day when you know everyone will want a decent breakfast.
And, perhaps most importantly, there are considerably fewer pans to wash afterwards. That alone earns it a few points from me!
