Merkel cooks breakfast for hubby

“The breakfast that I make for us is still the same one,” she said when asked what had changed since becoming chancellor. “Of course, overall I have less time. But it is important and very nice for me that my husband understands that.” She did not disclose what the Merkels enjoyed for breakfast.

Sauer, Merkel’s second husband and her former university professor, has kept a low profile during Merkel’s first year in power, appearing only at major events like US President George W Bush’s visit to eastern Germany in July.

Merkel also said she was looking forward to Christmas as only then did she have time to read a book, more often than not a long novel such as those by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Known for her reticence when probed about her private life, Merkel once said that given three spare days to do anything she wanted, she would spend them tidying her central Berlin apartment.