Robin's Rockin' Poached Eggs

My husband was in the mood for eggs this morning but he wanted something a bit different. He just threw this together and was AWESOME. It's a loose interpretation of Eggs Benedict. Or something like that.

Poached Eggs with Creamy Sauce

4 jumbo eggs
2 bagels split in half (we used 'everything' bagels but any plain or savory type would do)
1/2 c. heavy cream
1/8 c. grated sharp cheddar cheese
2 tbl. grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
Sea Salt & cracked black pepper to taste

Toast the bagels while you're working on the eggs and place each on a plate to serve four, or for a dinner portion place two on a plate to serve two. Or stop worrying about your waistline and cholesterol levels and eat all four. Your call.

Fill a saucepan about halfway with hot water. Bring this to a rolling boil, then reduce the heat until the water is no longer being disturbed. Crack an egg into a measuring cup then carefully pour this into the hot water. Repeat with the other three eggs (my photo just shows the one because I didn't realize how totally fantastic this was going to be until after I'd eaten my share already. Oops.)



While the eggs are poaching make the sauce. Heat the heavy cream over low to medium low heat, then add the cheddar and Parmigiano and heat until the cheese is melted. Stir occasionally. No salt necessary - the cheeses are salty enough.



Once the egg whites have set but the yolk is still runny remove the eggs one by one:



Place an egg gently (I said GENTLY, dammit!) on top of a toasted bagel, sprinkle with a bit of sea salt and freshly cracked black pepper, then spoon one fourth of the sauce over the top of the egg.



Isn't that pretty? Believe me, it tastes 100 times better than it looks so that's saying something (if you ignore my less-than-mad picture taking skillz). This was today's breakfast but we will most definitely be having this again real soon. He's thinking about maybe adding Canadian bacon next time but I really don't think it needs it. Delicious!

Roasted Sweet Potatoes - America's Test Kitchen Style

It's a Friday night and I knew I was making ham steaks and I'd bought sweet potatoes to go along with, but instead of regular ol' baking I wanted to roast them. Today was a monstrously boring day at work so I did a little surfing for the 'perfect roasted sweet potatoes'.

I decided to use a recipe from America's Test Kitchen - roast the potatoes covered with foil first, then roast uncovered - flip potatoes over halfway through. I'm not going to share because you can either get a one day pass for free or they charge for their content.

These were not rockin' sweet potatoes. I much prefer roasting them just tossed with olive oil, salt & pepper in a 400 degree oven for about 40 - 45 mins. The outside gets a nice crust but the inside is full flavored and soft.

The America's Test Kitchen way had a nice crust on the outside but the inside was flavorless and disappointing - the outside was caramelized and delicious but the inside was rice cakes. Meh.

That's two negative posts in a row but since no one is reading this anymore because I don't post regularly then it doesn't really matter.

But if you stumbled across this blog looking for the perfect roasted sweet potatoes try this instead:

3 medium sized sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed into 3/4" dice
2 tbl olive oil
1 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Toss the sweet potatoes with the olive oil, salt & pepper directly on top of a sheet pan. Put the pan into the preheated oven and roast the potatoes for 20 minutes. Use a spatula and scrape under the potatoes to remove the crusty bits from the bottom of the sheet pan and gently turn them over. Roast for another 20 to 25 minutes, or until the potatoes are fully cooked.

You should have a nice, sweet/salty crust on the outside but a creamy, flavorful sweet potato taste on the inside.

Score one: Kat

Still loving America's Test Kitchen, though. Just not this particular one.

In Which We Decide We Hate Mario Batali (Not Really, But Sort Of)

Wow. What a major disappointment! I spent the entire day in the kitchen for this... well, crap. I could have bought an already-made Boboli crust and added the toppings Mario suggested and it would have been better.

I'm all about the homemade anymore. There aren't a lot of prepackaged foods that I buy, but this was not even worth the cost of the flour it took to make this pizza.

The reviews on Amazon.com were just sparkling but at this point I can't help but wonder - are people simply piling on the compliments just because no one wants to be the first to disparage a beloved chef or do people really enjoy eating like this? It wasn't bad - don't get me wrong - but it really seriously wasn't great. Again: Boboli.

Also I couldn't come anywhere close to broiling as long as he recommended. My first pizzas (I could fit two on a sheet) were burnt to a crisp when they came out so at that point I had to watch them like a hawk to make sure the rest didn't burn.

My husband asked me if the sauce was simply tomato paste. In other words: no flavor.

Pfft and screw.

On the other hand, when I mess up a dinner I do it with finesse. Not only will I not be making this again, but I'm donating my copy of this book to my local library.

For those of you who think this is delicious pizza, enjoy! I guess my go-to easy meal now is just an omelet with sauteed asparagus and mushrooms....

UPDATE: After dinner I asked my 17 year old son to just throw what was left of the pizzas out and he asked me if he could save them for later instead. He thought they were good. I suppose I just don't care for super thin pizza crust and in all likelihood I'm just an unwashed Cretin. Or something like that.

And I'm keeping the damned book, too.

Pizza - Mario Batali Style - Part 1 - We Make Dough

Pizza used to be a real treat when I was a kid - my mom and dad divorced when I was pretty young so I was raised by a single mother and pizza just wasn't in the budget all that often. When we got pizza, we got pizza from Pizza Hut. Or Pizza Inn. One of the big chains (does Pizza Inn even exist anymore??). As a kid I thought it was wonderful.

Now that I'm all grown I've realized how truly crummy it is. I mean, they bring hot (mostly) food right to your door which is great, but instead of viewing pizza as a real treat like I did when I was a kid I now view it as something I order because I'm hungry but just don't feel like cooking.

I want to get back to the "pizza is like Christmas" kind of feeling and since I got Mario Batali's "Molto Gusto" cookbook for actual Christmas why not try to take it up a notch?

So, the first thing is the dough. He calls for 00 flour which my grocery store naturally doesn't sell. I've substituted all purpose flour instead - hey, we gotta do what we gotta do.

The dough turned out to be extremely wet. He mentions in his book that his dough is wetter then most bread doughs and he is not kidding. I'm a baker - we have homemade bread on a regular basis at this house - this dough is WAY wetter than a typical dough. I couldn't stop myself from throwing in a few sprinkles of flour while the stand mixer was kneading it because it was so wet.

There is totally a dirty joke in there somewhere.

Mario gives the directions for dividing and partially cooking the dough and I've discovered that I suck at making round pizzas. I did have to refrigerate mine for easier handling and there is no thicker portion around the outside edge because I used a rolling pin rather than hand stretching and when I tried to scrunch the dough to make an edge it wanted to tear. I'm of German descent - not Italian, so cut me some slack. Anyway, it's not like the fillings are piled so high they threaten to slide off the edges so it should be okay. I hope.

So here is what my par-baked pizza crusts look like after cooking:



They're like oversized tortillas but fatter. This is worrysome and I've searched the internet but am not finding scads of pictures of a finished Mario Batili pizza made by the home cook.

I've chosen to make the mushroom pizza, pepperoni pizza and balsamic onion pizza so we'll see how that goes in the next post. Oh, and by the way, I am not buying his signature gridde to make these pizzas. I cooked these using a T-Fall cheapo and they browned just fine.

Still reminding me of tortillas, though...