January 8, 2011: Basic Scrambled Eggs

Scrambled eggs is one of those dishes that can be simple, but many people have their variations on the recipe. This is my take on scrambled eggs.



The ingredients are simple - eggs, butter, salt and pepper. Added ingredients range from water, milk, heavy cream, sour cream, creme fraiche or nothing at all.

I opt for simplicity where I generally use milk, water or nothing.

Another variation between recipes is cooking time where recipes call for cooking anywhere from 1 to 5 minutes.

I believe that in a heated pan over medium heat, scrambled eggs should cook in under 1 minutes once the beaten eggs is poured into the pan. Any longer you run the risk of ending up with dry eggs.

Basic ingredients (Scrambled eggs for two)
3 large eggs (beaten/whipped for about 1 minute)
1 T Milk
A little salt
Butter for cooking


My YouTube Video below

Enjoy!

December 14, 2010: Daring Cooks Poaching

Jenn and Jill have challenged The Daring Cooks to learn to perfect the technique of poaching an egg. They chose Eggs Benedict recipe from Alton Brown, Oeufs en Meurette from Cooking with Wine by Anne Willan, and Homemade Sundried Tomato & Pine Nut Seitan Sausages (poached) courtesy of Trudy of Veggie num num.

For this month, Jenn and Jill decided to focus on a technique that seems intimidating to many, but with a little practice it’s really not that hard at all – poaching. All poaching means is cooking something in simmering (not boiling) water. And what more perfect way to practice the skill of poaching than learning how to poach an egg? They can make a tasty breakfast, or salad accompaniment; there are so many different ways to use poached eggs, and they are used in cuisines from a variety of cultures.

The 1st recipe is one of the most well known poached egg dishes: eggs benedict – an open sandwich of English muffin, Canadian bacon, poached egg, and hollandaise sauce. This rich and decadent dish can be served as a really nice breakfast or brunch for having company over, and is sure to impress! The “daring” with this dish is in successfully poaching an egg in water, as well as making one of the famed mother sauces of France, the hollandaise.

Our 2nd recipe, oeufs en meurette (eggs in meurette sauce), is a classic dish from the region of Bourgogne (Burgundy) in France. It involves poaching an egg in a red wine/stock, which will then turn into a fabulous reduction sauce. One serves the poached egg on top of fried croûtes with sauce, bacon, mushrooms and pearl onions. This is also a great dish for breakfast/brunch as well.

[Eat4Fun - For this challenge I'm making Hollandaise sauce and Bacon Eggs Benedict Deluxe. The deluxing is in the form of tomatoes, mushrooms and sauteed spinach.

Also, I've taken a whole new approach to documenting my results. I'm going video!]



Mandatory Items: To use the technique of poaching an egg.

Recipe Sources:
Hollandaise sauce by Alton Brown
[It's been a long time since I've made Hollandaise. The last time I ended up with mayonnaise. I didn't know about the trick of adding hot water to thin it out the mayonnaise thick sauce.]

Eggs Benedict
[To be exact, Bacon Eggs Benedict Deluxe]

Ingredients
4 eggs (size is your choice)
2 English muffins*
4 slices of Canadian bacon/back bacon (or plain bacon if you prefer)
Chives, for garnish
Splash of vinegar (for poaching) [I used 2 T vinegar per quart of water.]

For the hollandaise (makes 1.5 cups):
3 large egg yolks
1 tsp. (5 ml) water
¼ tsp. (1 ¼ ml/1½ g) sugar
12 Tbl. (170 g/6 oz.) unsalted butter, chilled and cut in small pieces [Used salted butter]
½ tsp. (2 ½ ml/3 g) kosher salt [Since I used salted butter, additional salt was not needed.]
2 tsp. (10 ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice
Pinch cayenne pepper (optional)

Directions:

Hollandaise Sauce
1. Fill a medium saucepan halfway with water and bring to a simmer.

2. Cut the chilled butter into small pieces and set aside.

3. Whisk egg yolks and 1 tsp. (5 ml) water in a mixing bowl large enough to sit on the saucepan without touching the water (or in top portion of a double boiler). Whisk for 1–2 minutes, until egg yolks lighten. Add the sugar and whisk 30 seconds more.

4. Place bowl on saucepan over simmering water and whisk steadily 3–5 minutes (it only took about 3 for me) until the yolks thicken to coat the back of a spoon.

5. Remove from heat (but let the water continue to simmer) and whisk in the butter, 1 piece at a time. Move the bowl to the pan again as needed to melt the butter, making sure to whisk constantly.

6. Once all the butter is incorporated, remove from heat and whisk in the salt, lemon juice, and cayenne pepper (if using).

7. Keep the hollandaise warm while you poach your eggs in a thermos, carafe, or bowl that you’ve preheated with warm water.

Poaching eggs -
8. If the water simmering in your pan has gotten too low, add enough so that you have 2–3 inches of water and bring back to a simmer.

9. Add salt and a splash of vinegar (any kind will do). I added about a tablespoon of vinegar to my small saucepan (about 3 cups of water/720 ml of water), but you may need more if you’re using a larger pan with more water. [I used 2 T of vinegar for every quart of water.]

10. Crack eggs directly into the very gently simmering water (or crack first into a bowl and gently drop into the water), making sure they’re separated. Cook for 3 minutes for a viscous but still runny yolk.

11. While waiting for the eggs, quickly fry the Canadian/back bacon and toast your English muffin.

12. Top each half of English muffin with a piece of bacon. Remove the eggs with a slotted spoon, draining well, and place on top of the bacon. Top with hollandaise and chopped chives, and enjoy!

Bacon Eggs Benedict with tomato, mushroom and sauteed spinach.
Although the egg yolks turned out medium, cooked solid but still golden, the egg whites were very tender, almost melt in your mouth tender. That's the advantage of poaching.

Poaching slowly cooks protein at low heat so the protein molecules bind together loosely, which means tender.

Apr 12: Eggs for Easter?

Happy Easter!

Today is Easter and I didn't buy any dye to make Easter eggs. However, I got to thinking about hard boiled eggs. This year I'll make hard eggs two ways.

Egg #1: Slow Cooked Eggs... Really Low and Slow
Last year, I experimented with hard boiled vs hard cooked eggs. I was taught the preferred method was to hard cook eggs by soaking in boiled water. This is supposed to make a tender hard cooked egg. However, from my experiment, I couldn't tell the difference between the two methods so I just boil away for 7 minutes.

I remembered from a cooking class that egg whites will solidify (coagulate) at 140F to 150F while the yolk will solidify 150F to 160F.

Hmmm... [pondering] If we want a tender egg, then we just need to cook the egg until it solidifies. Cook the egg low and slow so the proteins don't toughen up.

Thinking I hit on something unique, I searched the web and found that chefs have been experimenting around with sous vide eggs where cooking is accomplished in a highly accurate water bath.

I don't have an immersion cooker, but I improvised one with a large pot of water. Using a lot of water is the key since the water will act as a heat tank - holding the temperature steady than using a small amount of water.

The Method:
1) Bring a large pot of water to 160F. Actually, my digital thermometer is slow to respond and low by 3 degrees... so I just kept the hot water bath between 155 to 160F.


2) When the temperature has leveled off and steady, I dropped in 3 eggs on a steamer basket. The temperature dropped 1 degree but came back up within a minute. Looks like the temperature will remain steady.

Cooking time: 35 - 40 minutes.


After 35-40 minutes, the eggs where placed in a cold water bath.

I was hungry so I gave one a try with salt and pepper.
As you can see the egg whites and yolk are solid, but not firm as you would have with a hard cooked egg. The egg white is very soft like a light custard. The yolk is firm.


Egg #2: Chinese Tea Eggs
This recipe is the opposite of the one above. No low and slow here... It's a double cook method is a couple hours of simmering.

Reference recipe: The Classic Chinese Cookbook by Leung, Mai, Harper & Row 1976

Tea Mixture
4 t Salt
1/2 t Five Spice Powder
4 tea bags
3 C Water
3 T Dark Soy Sauce
1 T Light Soy Sauce

Add the ingredients to a sauce pan and bring to a boil.

1) Start with hard boiled eggs.
Crack the shell, but do not peel.
Add to the tea mixture and let simmer for 2 hours.
After 2 hours of simmering, turn off the heat and let soak for 2 hours.


The results... the cracks in the eggshell allows the soy sauce-tea mixture to "color" the egg. The inside of the shell looks pretty cool too.


Side by side comparison of the two eggs.
As you can tell, the whites from the low and slow egg are very soft where it doesn't hold it's shape. The tea egg is solid.


As you can see, the yolks are vastly different. Firm yet tender compared to firm and powdery. Also, the long soak created a green ring around the tea egg. For the tea eggs, I hard boiled the eggs and immediately cooled the egg to prevent to green ring. However, the reheating must have driven the iron back towards the yolk.


I'm not a big fan of hard eggs, but it's fun to try something different.
The low and slow egg worked as I expected and not bad. I don't know if I dig the very soft egg white. It's a texture thing. If I try this again, I'll shoot for a higher temperature.... maybe 160 to 165F.

The tea eggs have a nice flavor, but powdery egg yolks are unappealing to me. Maybe that's why I prefer deviled eggs... the mayo moistens the cooked yolk.

Jan 28: CNY Something Sweet Experiment

A coworker asked about Chinese dim sum custard tartlets. In phonetic Cantonese, "On Tot" which is "egg tart". His problems was the custard baked up bubbly, instead of smooth and silky.

Researching my cookbooks, I came across a recipe that used eggs and water. What no milk or cream? Now, I have to be open-minded and give it a try. However, I wanted go to the other end of the spectrum and use all cream.

I wanted to focus on the custard so I used a prepared pie crust for the shell.

Chinese Egg Tartlets
Water Based Filling
1/2C + 2T Hot Water
1/4C Sugar
2 Eggs, beaten
1/2 t Vanilla
1/2 t Vinegar... Vinegar!

Cream Based Filling
1/2C + 2T Cream
1/4C Sugar
2 Eggs, beaten
1/2 t Vanilla

1. Dissolve sugar in the liquid. Add the vanilla and vinegar. When cool, add the beaten egg and whisk lightly. Set aside.

Before the egg was added, water mixture on the left and the cream mixture on the right.


Since I used a premade pie crust, I had to cut out round for the muffin pan.
Using a 4 inch diameter cutter... was a little to large with only a yield of 4 round per crust.


Being frugal, I switched to a 3" diameter can... many more rounds per crust. I'm happy. :)


However, I had to roll out to 4" Diameter to match the muffin paper.


The shells ready for filling....


Left side - six filled with the water based egg mixture and the right six filled with the cream based egg mixture.

Bake 375F for 20 minutes.


Much my surprise... the water based custard (on the left) actually has a smoother appearance.


Also, silkier interior.


Not what I expected... The water based custard looked very similar to the tartlets found in dim sum restaurants. Both were much too sweet and too much vanilla. The cream based custard was rich, but also had a stronger eggy flavor.

Besides the cream... the only difference between the two fillings was vinegar. Hmmm... I wonder if that had anything to do with the appearance? Now, I'm gonna have to think about it some more... and try again in the future.

A few things I would change is use less sugar (cut in half the amount used) and same goes for the vanilla. I would also add just a touch of salt. A little salt always seems to help dessert dishes.

Jan 22: Egg Lemon Soup (Avgolemono)

After poaching the chicken for the mole and the rest of the bones, I made a chicken stock. Also, with a half lemon from last night, I wanted to try making an Egg Lemon Soup, which is a classic Greek soup, Avgolemono.

Another plus is the few ingredients needed to make the soup.

For today, I made a small batch to try it out.

Egg Lemon Soup
2 C Chicken Broth
1 egg white, whipped to stiff peaks
1 egg yolk
1/2 Lemon, juiced
1/2 C Rice, I had cooked brown rice


1. Bring the stock to a boil... turn off the heat.

2. Beat the egg yolk and combine with the egg white.

3. When the stock is ready, mix the lemon juice into the egg mixture.

4. Temper the egg mixture, by slowly adding about 1 Cup of hot stock while mixing the egg mixture.

Tempering the egg.


Pour the egg into the hot stock, turn heat to medium. Generally, the instructions are to heat the soup without boiling or simmering, to prevent curdling, until thick.
NOTE: Being a geek, I placed a thermometer into the soup and cooked to 170F. Why 170F? Supposedly, temperatures above 160F will destroy any bad bacteria lurking in the egg. The extra 10 F is to account for any inaccuracies in the thermometer.


The finished soup garnished with a little green onion.


A nice chicken soup with a tart lemon finish. The soup wasn't as thick as I hoped, but still had a nice velvety consistency.