Eggs: aren’t just for breakfast any more
For once, advertising created a slogan that is actually true: “The incredible, edible egg”.
The Good Cook ‘s volume “Eggs and Cheese” that was published by the Editors of Time-Life Books (long out of print but look for the whole series of cook books in thrift stores) lists whole chapters on the magic of eggs: Fried, Poached, Hard-boiled, Baked, Scrambled, Omelets; Custards, Puddings and Soufflés; Pies and Quiches, Fondues and Rarebits. Just reading the index makes you hungry.
Wild bird eggs were eaten by the earliest hunter-gathers but as early as 2,500 B.C. humans began domesticating fowls to ensure a predictable egg supply, so as you can imagine, by now, there are an almost endless number of eggs dishes. Eggs are so essential to professional cooking that legends says that they are the reason the upright, white hats worn by chefs known as La Toques have 100 pleats. Ruth Edwards in her book ‘A Pageant of Hats, Ancient and Modern’ wrote: "It was regarded as natural that any chef, worthy of the name, could cook an egg at least one hundred ways.”
You might be thinking, “What’s all the fuss about? It’s just an egg.” Michael Ruhlman begs to differ.
Ruhlman, author of more than 25 books, co-author with Thomas Keller on several cookbooks, publishes his own cooking podcast, appeared on “The Next Iron Chief” and several Anthony Bourdan TV episodes, chose to write an entire book called: ”Egg: a Culinary Exploration of the World’s Most Versatile Ingredient.”
In the introduction he calls it , ”The greatest of all our foods” and “Containing all of the nutrients required to create life, eggs give our bodies a powerful combination of proteins, aminio acids, fatty acids, antioxidants, minerals, and vitamins, a package unmatched by any other single food.” And, no, he doesn’t work for the American Egg Board.
When most Americans think of eggs, they think of sunny-side up eggs, maybe a western omelet or poached eggs blanketed with hollandaise sauce: in other words, breakfast.
But, other parts of the world rely on them for lunch and dinner. San Sebastián, just over the French border in Spain, is famous for its Old Town streets lined with tapas bars. When my wife and I were there on the nightly tapas crawl (just to be clear, we were not crawling: that’s just what they called going from one bar to another, each with a different specialty) I came to love tortilla de patatas (potato tortilla). In Spain tortilla means flat cake.
Anya von Bremzen, author of “The New Spanish Table,” writes, “What would happen to Spanish cuisine if the egg suddenly disappeared? The idea is too shocking to even consider, as there are times when the entire Spanish diet seems to revolve around yolks and whites.” She wrote a whole chapter of egg dishes but claims tortilla de patatas, as the country’s egg masterpiece.
Note: for all three recipes, famed TV chef Alton Brown says he never cracks eggs directly into a pan-always cracks them into a cup or ramekin. This eliminates adding any shell from the broken egg and for a poached dish you use the cup to gently slide the egg out into the waiting bath. And, if the yoke breaks you haven’t ruined the entire dish.
My version of Tortilla de Patatas
Serves 2 as light main dish. We sometimes make a salad and have crusty bread on hand.
1 medium-size cooked Yukon Gold potato (I always make extra when I roast a chicken on a bed of potatoes: they absorb that wonderful fat and juice dripping down)
2 tablespoons or more extra-virgin olive oil
½ small white onion, peeled, diced into ¼ inches
Kosher salt
4 large, fresh eggs (this is when you want to use those eggs from the Farmers Market)
2 tablespoons milk (or cream, if you have that on hand)
Turn on broiler oven. Heat olive oil in an 8-inch nonstick skillet with a metal handle over medium-high heat until very hot. Reduce heat to medium-low and add onion and a dash of salt. Stir occasionally until they start to soften. Add diced potatoes and dash of salt and cook until everything starts to brown. About 10 minutes.
While vegetables cook, place the eggs, milk and a couple of pinches of salt in a large mixing bowl and beat until combined. When potatoes are crispy, gently stir eggs into the potato mixture and integrate everything.
Reduce heat and begin shaking the skillet, running a thin spatula around the edge so that some of the egg runs under. Keep cooking until the top and center is still a little wet but not liquid, 6-8 minutes.
If you are feeling Spanish, you place a rimless plate slightly larger than your skillet and, using oven mitts, quickly flip the tortilla into the plate, slide it back on the skillet, cook until firm and then flip again to brown the first side,
If you’re like me and don’t like dropping your dinner on the stove, simply slide the skillet under the hot broiler and wait around 5 minutes or so, checking to see when the top browns. Make sure you use a thick oven mitt to remove the pan and let it cool on top of the stove for a few minutes.
The tortilla should now be completely free of the pan. Slide it onto a cutting board, slice into wedges and serve warm or at room temperature.
Shakshuka
Serves 2 to 4
Shakshuka originated in Tunisia but it has found a home in Israel and in the many Israeli/Middle Eastern cookbooks that have flooded the market lately. Even “My Paris Kitchen” by David Lebovitz has a version. The reason is, it tastes so good! So far, this is my favorite. You’re simply poaching eggs in a spicy tomato sauce instead of water. There are lots of variations often with potatoes included in the winter and eggplants in the summer.
Adapted from “Jerusalem: a Cookbook” by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi
2 Tablespoon olive oil
2 Tablespoon harissa (I like the spread from Les Moulins Mahjoub)
2 teaspoons tomato paste
2 large red pepper, cut into ¼ dice
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 28-oz. can crushed tomatoes
4 large eggs
Kosher salt
Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over medium heat and add the harissa, tomato paste, peppers, garlic, cumin and a pinch of salt. Stir over medium heat for about 8 minutes to soften the pepper.
Add the tomatoes, bring to a gentle simmer and cook for a further 10 minutes until you have a thick sauce. Taste for seasoning.
Make an indention in the sauce with a large spoon then gentle break an egg and slip it into the indention. Continue with the other eggs. Cover the pan and simmer gently for 8 to 10 minutes, until the eggs are somewhat set but yolk is still runny. Remove from heat for a couple of moments before spooning an egg and surrounding sauce into individual plates.
Serve with crusty bread to dip in the sauce.
France also has a love affair of eggs but it never seems to serve them in the morning. The omelet (omelette in France) is a masterpiece fashioned in the “less is more” philosophy: just a few perfect ingredients, quickly cooked.
Elizabeth David was an English author of cookbooks who, after World War II, helped convince the English that is was okay to think about cooking as a serious subject. “An Omelette and a Glass of Wine” is a collection of articles David originally wrote for different publications that pulls together some of her best writing on food and cooking. In the title article, she gives the omelette recipe from a favorite restaurant when she lived in the ancient city of Avignon in southern France. There are a million recipes for an omelet but search YouTube for Jacques Pépin and Omelet to enjoy an expert talking you through every motion of cooking one.
Omelette Molière
Serves one
Adapted from “An Omelette and A Glass of Wine” by Elizabeth David
1 tablespoon grated Parmesan cheese
3 eggs
Black pepper (some people use white pepper with eggs but others hate the taste: your call)
½ oz unsalted butter
1 tablespoon Gruyère cheese, diced
1 tablespoon heavy cream
Beat parmesan with eggs and a little pepper.
Warm the pan a minute over the fire. Put in butter. Turn up the flame. When the butter bubbles and is about to change color, pour in the egg mixture.
Add Gruyère and cream. Tip the pan towards you, easing some of mixture from the far edge into the middle. Then tip the pan away from you again, filling the empty space with some of the still-liquid eggs. By the time you have done this twice, the Gruyère will have started to melt and your omelette is ready.
Fold it over in thirds with a fork and slide it on to the warmed omelette dish. Serve it instantly.
And, yes, she did enjoy a glass of Alsatin Traminer or a Meursault wine with it.