Variations on Eggs Benedict

Tags

breakfast, brunch, eggs, hollandaise

eggs benedict

The well known chick-flick, Runaway Bride, focused on the recurring question throughout the movie of how did Maggy like her eggs. Her self-discovery answer at the movie’s end was “eggs benedict”. With the question posed repeatedly in the movie the viewer inevitably asks themselves, “How do I like MY eggs?”
I agree with Maggy, eggs benedict is a favorite, but it seems like one of those things that you just don’t throw together like a fried egg and toast. I’ve put together an adaptation that can be quick enough for a not too busy morning or a great simple brunch offering.

Eggs benedict can be problematic in Israel due to the lack of two traditional ingredients, Canadian bacon and English muffins. To resolve this I actually attempted to make homemade English muffins that turned out like dough hockey pucks. So to look for alternatives I decided on unsliced baguette or unsliced sourdough, a dense enough bread to succeed in the recipe and not absorb the hollandaise like a sponge.

Although I don’t keep kosher, I’ve come up with a meat kosher (if you use a butter substitute or olive oil in the hollandaise) or non-pork consumer alternative. Your choice. The base of the eggs benedict starts with a slab of sour dough bread you cut from the loaf yourself and toast. Then I take a lunch meat offering from packaged deli products (msg free only) or go to a specialty deli for a more kindred meat to original recipe meat and make an easy blender hollandaise taken from ‘Simply Recipes’

Easy Blender Hollandaise
Ingredients
•3 egg yolks (see how to separate eggs)
•1 tablespoon lemon juice
•1/2 teaspoon salt
•1/8 teaspoon cayenne (optional)
•10 tablespoons unsalted butter (if using salted butter, skip the added salt)

1 Melt the butter slowly in a small pot. Try not to let it boil – you want the moisture in the butter to remain there and not steam away.

2 Add the egg yolks, lemon juice, salt and cayenne (if using) into your blender. Blend the egg yolk mixture at a medium to medium high speed until it lightens in color, about 20-30 seconds. The friction generated by the blender blades will heat the yolks a bit. The blending action will also introduce a little air into them, making your hollandaise a bit lighter.

3 Once the yolks have lightened in color, turn the blender down to its lowest setting (if you only have one speed on your blender it will still work), and drizzle in the melted butter slowly, while the blender is going. Continue to buzz for another couple seconds after the butter is all incorporated.

4 Turn off the blender and taste the sauce. It should be buttery, lemony and just lightly salty. If it is not salty or lemony enough, you can add a little lemon juice or salt to taste. If you want a thinner consistency, add a little warm water. Pulse briefly to incorporate the ingredients one more time. Store until needed in a warm spot, like on or next to the stovetop. Use within an hour or so.

Assembly
Poach eggs a la Julia Child or rewatch ‘Julie and Julia’. Bring salted water to a soft bubbly simmer, crack open eggs and put in a small container, slide them into simmery water. As eggs cook in simmering water, gently coddle with slotted spoon until white becomes opaque, cover pan with a lid and spoon out when white just solidifies over the yolk. This will only take a few minutes.

Steam some spinach for a dressing, or just use another decorative green, heat the deli meat in microwave, assemble with toasted bread, 1 meat layer and place poached eggs on top. Pour easy hollandaise over and voila!

Tiramisu – Success!!

Tags

cheese, coffee, cream, dairy, dessert, eggs, family favorite, italian, mascarpone, no-bake, no-boil, rich

stand-up tiramisu

I have tried making a number of recipes for tiramisu, step by step from the so-called “Perfecting Tiramisu” recipe from Cook’s Illustrated Dec. 2007 (maybe that’s the key…’perfecting’…). I’ve tried other internet recipes as well as a few from epicurious. I received advise from a pastry chef whose recipe was exquisite, his secret was mascarpone was largest portion, I remembered that but lost the notes he gave me.
Some are cooked over a double boiler, some raw. Whatever I tried the result was always the same ‘tira-me-soup’. I tried putting it in individual cups so the run off wouldnt be so obvious, I even tried adding a bit of neutral gelatine hoping for a firmer result which turned into a solid wobble of laughable tiramisu jello.

Finally after looking through all the recipes under tiramisu in Epicurious and reading the reader’s tips and remembering the chef’s advice I tried and succeeded with their suggestions to make one that worked with a few additions for improvement after reading between the lines. After one chill hour in the freezer and five more in the fridge it stood up to be served on its own plate and was as good as the one we had in Padua, Italy.

1 250 gram container of Italian mascarpone (if you dont have a digital scale and you are a serious cook, buy one!)
ladyfingers
1 cup of strong coffee (I use decaf)
1 tbsp of amaretto
3/4 cup sugar
3 eggs seperated
1/2 cup whipping cream
1 vanilla bean, insides scraped out
grated dark chocolate for decoration

In a mixer blend for 2 minutes the egg yolks, sugar and mascarpone. Add the vanilla bean insides that you scraped out.
Clean bowl and whip attachment thoroughly and whip egg whites until very firm and stiff. Fold the two previous mixtures together. Clean bowl and beater again and whip the whipped cream until stiff peaks form. Fold gently into mascapone mixture you just folded before.

In a seperate flat dish pour one cup of coffee and add amaretto tbsp. Take each lady finger and dip briefly on each side, moving quickly in seconds and dont let them get drenched, they should be somewhat dry in the middle. Place a row of the lady fingers on the bottom of a glass bowl, 8 inches, square or round since the ladyfingers will be pliable. Pour half the now readied mascarpone and egg mixture over the ladyfingers, repeat process with one more layer of lady fingers on top. Pour remaining half of mascarpone over top layer of ladyfingers. Decorate with grated dark chocolate. Put in freezer for one hour, chill in fridge for 5. Will serve at least 8 dinner guests.