Showing posts with label Eggs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eggs. Show all posts
I guess just about all of the kids will be back in school now. What an incredibly frightening time for everyone. I have seven school aged grandchildren and I would be lying if I said I wasn't concerned for them. I think they are so brave.
Their lives are very different at the moment than ours were growing up. We had so much freedom in comparison. Life was so much simpler. I pray every day that things will soon be back to normal for them, and in the meantime I pray for their safety.
They are lunch box toting kids. My DIL posted a lovely photo on FB the other day of their middle boy making his lunch for school. He looked like he was enjoying himself! |
When I lived in Ontario, seemingly a whole lifetime ago, we often visited my then Sister in Law in Toronto. She was married to a Jewish fellow and used to bring home the most delicious bagels from a Jewish Bagel near their house on Avenue Road. These bagels were so fresh and so tasty, they completely spoilt me for every enjoying those insipid bagels you find in the shops. When you have tasted an authentic Jewish Bagel, there is nothing else that quite comes up to it.
One good thing to do with those store-bought bagels however that is quite delicious is to make Breakfast Quiche Stuffed Bagels. These are a brilliant way of enjoying quiche without all the faffing about of making pastry or a crust!
To do this, I slice the bagels in half through the middle and then scoop out any bread from the middles leaving a bit of a basil for the filling. I then start layering in my quiche ingredients.
I like to use some spring onions, chopped. A cooked sausage, chopped. Cooked bacon, chopped and of course cheese, fresh farm eggs and cream.
I layer in the onion, bacon, sausage and half the cheese and then beat the egg togeher with the cream and pour it over top, finishing it all off with the remainder of the cheese.
These then get baked until the egg mixture soufflees up into a quiche type of filling, rich and delicious.
I garnish them with some minced fresh chives. By all means you can vary the filling ingredients. Add chopped peppers if you like them.
Leave out the bacon or the sausage, or both and make them completely vegetarian. Add some smoked salmon if you are so inclined and dot in some cream cheese. Garnish with some sprigs of dill.
You really can make these your own by using whatever quiche fillings you enjoy most of all. Ham and Swiss cheese is also quite nice!
Although perfectly sized for two, this recipe is very easily doubled or tripled to feed more. This would make a great weekend breakfast when entertaining. Add some fresh juice, coffee if you are so disposed and a fresh fruit salad and you have a breakfast fit for a King!
Quiche Stuffed Bagels
Yield: 2
prep time: 15 Mcook time: 15 Mtotal time: 30 M
Easy and delicious and no pastry involved. Easily doubled to feed more if you wish
Ingredients:
- 2 plain bagels
- 1 cooked breakfast sausage, skin removed and diced
- 2 rashers of crisp cooked bacon, finely chopped
- 2 spring onions, trimmed and finely chopped
- 8 TBS grated cheddar cheese
- 3 medium free range eggs, lightly beaten
- 2 TBS heavy cream
- salt and black pepper to taste
- finely chopped chives to garnish
Instructions:
- Preheat the oven to 190*C/375*F/ gas mark 5. Have ready a baking sheet lined with aluminium foil.
- Beat the eggs together with the cream.
- Prepare your onion, bacon, sausage and cheese.
- Cut your bagels in half through the middle. Carefully remove all of the breading in the middle of each bagel half making a hollow place to insert your filling.
- Begin by sprinkling 1/4 of the onion into each bagel half. Top with 1/4 of the sausage and the bacon. Sprinkle 1 TBS of cheese over each. Season with some salt and papper and then divide the beaten egg/cream mixture between each, pouring it over the cheese. Sprinkle the remaining cheese over top of each.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes, until set and golden brown. Sprinkle with chopped chives and serve immediately.
My husband doesn't like things really crisp, but if you do want your bagels really crisp, brush them with butter and bake them for a few minutes to crisp them up prior to filling them with your desired fillings. I think you are really going to enjoy these!
Many years ago, when I was still a child, my mother came down with the stomach flu.
I could not have been any older than 6 or 7 years old, but it still is very clear in my mind and I know my age because of the house we were living in at the time.
It was left to my father to cook for us, my mother was that ill. The only thing he knew how to cook was fried eggs. And so . . . we had fried eggs for every meal that day. Sometime during the night afterwards . . . you guessed it . . . I got the stomach flu myself.
It was many, many years before I could ever face eating a fried egg again. In fact, it has only been in recent years.
One thing Easter always meant in our home was that there would be plenty of eggs to be eaten up.
Mom used to blow some of them out for scrambled eggs for those of us who couldn't abide fried eggs, and then the others would get fried eggs.
Always served with butter fried slabs of salty ham, leftover from the Easter dinner. It was always ham for Easter dinner, never anything else.
We would enjoy it cold and sliced along with mashed potatoes, salad and another vegetable. The star of Easter dinner was always the Lemon Meringue Pie we had for dessert.
The star of Easter Monday was always fried ham & eggs. I know in some families that for supper on Easter Day they would have egg eating contests, seeing how many eggs one person could consume.
That was never done in our house. We had one egg per person, two maximum. Mom was always very careful about the amount of food she let us eat.
One nice thick slice of ham/gammon. Fried in butter until golden brown on both sides.
The fatty edge getting all stick and sweet from the marmalade glaze. OH so good . . .
Sunny side up eggs are always a delight. It goes without saying that you will want to use the freshest eggs that you have, and they should always be started at room temperature.
If they are refrigerator cold, then just pop them into a bowl of warm water for fifteen minutes. That will soon bring them to room temp.
The only real decision you have to make when frying the eggs is to cook and serve them sunny side up, the whites softly set and the yolks beautifully runny, or to flip them over and serve them over easy . . . both with a golden brown lacy frill around the edges.
Look at that lovely glazed and golden slice of thick ham . . . perfect . . .
The yolk of the egg, perfectly runny and ready for dipping . . .
It doesn't get much better than this. You can use whatever fat you want to fry the egg in (I always fry my ham in butter), but I prefer a flavourless sunflower oil to fry my egg in.
It doesn't burn, so you can have it well heated when the egg lands in the pan, which gives you that lovely golden brown ruffle. Butter tends to burn.
Proper Fried Ham & Eggs
Yield: 1
You just repeat this process for as many servings as you wish. The end result is perfectly fried eggs accompanied with a thick slab of butter fried ham. Toast fingers for dipping into the runny yolks are a must!
Ingredients:
- 1 thick slice of roast ham/gammon
- 1 fresh egg, at room temperature (or two if you can handle that many)
- 1 small knob of butter
- 1 TBS of flavourless oil
To serve:
- Hot buttered toast, cut into fingers, crusts on or off as you please
Instructions:
How to cook Proper Fried Ham & Eggs
- You will need two skillets as the ham and the eggs will be cooked separately.
- Start the ham first. Melt the knob of butter in one skillet over medium heat. Once it begins to foam add the slice of ham. Cook on one side until golden brown, turn down the heat, then flip over and continue to cook on the other side.
- While the ham is browning on the second side, heat the oil in the other skillet. Crack the egg onto a saucer and slip into the hot oil. Cover with a lid and leave over low heat, at which time the edges of the egg will be ruffled and golden brown, the whites set and the yolk still runny. If the white is not set, recover and cook for a further 30 seconds.
- Slide onto a heated plate, season with some coarse black pepper and flakes of salt. Add the golden slice of ham and serve immediately with the buttered toast fingers for dipping into that golden yolk.
Today I expect I will be making a casserole of some sort with the leftover ham. What is your favourite thing to do with leftover ham? I really want to know!
This content (written and photography) is the sole property of The English Kitchen. Any reposting or misuse is not permitted. If you are reading this elsewhere, please know that it is stolen content and you may report it to me at: mariealicejoan at aol dot com
Thanks so much for visiting. Do come again!
I have become very thrifty over these past weeks. Something I am ashamed to say that I should have been practicing all along. Nothing is going to waste in my kitchen. They are saying it could be six months until the present crisis is over and I am keen to make everything we have stretch as far as I can.
Any thing hash is a great way to make good use of just whatever you have in your refrigerator that needs using up and topping it with a poached egg, turns it into a well balanced meal, containing some carbs, plenty of veg and a protein.
It also makes a great vegetarian meal, for those of you who are not opposed to eating eggs.
The hash is composed of whatever you happen to have in the refrigerator that needs using up. In my case I had a baked potato left from the other day, which wouldn't have fed two people normally, but when you add a host of other vegetables to it, it becomes like the loaves and fishes and magically multiplies to feed more.
I had a head of broccoli in the refrigerator, some carrots and a swede (rutabaga). The stems on broccoli are often wasted and thrown away. They can tend to be a bit fribrous, but if you trim of any fribrous bits there is no reason why you can't eat the rest. You can also eat the leaves of broccoli.
All of my veg was cut into 1/2 inch cubes and tossed together with a small chopped onion and then cooked together in my iron skillet, along with some oil and butter.
I cooked it first over low heat, covered so that the raw vegetables could cook to crispy tender and then I turned up the heat, seasoning it all with some salt and pepper, and cooking it until I had some golden brown carmelised bits. The perfect hash.
You could of course add a quanitity of chopped cooked meat to this, along with some herbs, but I didn't have any lefover roast or any other meat that needed using and so I decided to top the hash with poached eggs.
You could, of course, do a fried egg, but I figured we would both benefit from the healthier option and so I poached us each an egg.
People can be a bit afraid of poaching eggs, but there is no need to be afraid really. I have given exact instructions to give perfect results.
It helps if your eggs are at room temperature. I also like to break them into a small bowl before slipping them individually into simmering water. Don't ever tip them into boiling water or they will break up all over the place.
Cook them on the heat for exactly one minute, then take them off, cover the pan and let them sit for exactly ten minutes. You will have perfectly poached eggs. Ready to scoop out with a slotted spoon onto kitchen paper towelling.
Once drained they are ready to use in any way you want. In this case, atop a nice plate of crispy anything hash!
Anything Hash & Perfectly Poached Eggs
Yield: 2
A delicious supper for two which makes a good use of what's in the refrigerator
Ingredients:
- 2 cups of vegetables cut into small cubes (today I used a leftover baked potato, some carrot, some swede(rutabaga), broccoli stems and a small onion)
- 1/2 TBS butter
- 1/2 TBS oil
- salt and black pepper
- 2 large free range eggs
Instructions:
How to cook Anything Hash & Perfectly Poached Eggs
- Prepare your vegetables. Peel the carrots and swede, trim any fibrous bits from the broccoli stems, saving any leaves. Chop them all into a uniform size along with the potato and onion.
- Heat the butter and oil in a heavy based skillet. (I used my cast iron.) Once the butter begins to foam, add the vegetables. Turn them to coat in the fat then turn the heat down low, cover and allow to cook over low heat for about 10 minutes until everything is tender. Remove the lid, turn up the heat, season to taste with salt and black pepper and cook, turning over occasionally until golden brown in places. Keep warm while you poach your eggs.
- Have all your eggs at room temperature and break each into a small bowl before you start. Bring a pot of water, to which you have added 1 tsp of vinegar, to a slow simmer over gentle heat. Once you can see tiny bubbles on the bottom of the pan, carefully add the eggs, one at a time.
- Simmer, without covering for exactly 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and let the eggs sit in the hot water for exactly ten minutes. (a timer is incredibly useful here) At the end of the time you should have a perfect poached egg, with a beautifully translucent and pefectly set white and a soft and creamy yolk. Remove the eggs with a slotted spoon, one at a time onto some paper kitchen toweling to drain.
- Divide the hash and spoon it onto heated serving dishes. Top each serving with a poached egg and serve immediately.
The skys have turned to pewter today and it is threatening of rain. March is about to go out like a Lion methinks! Oh well, so much for that old wive's tale as it came in like a Lion as well!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Social Icons