Eggs Benedict seems easy to make. Broken down into its simplest parts, it’s just a poached egg, hollandaise, veal bacon and a toasted English muffin. So why does such a simple dish, terrify would-be brunch chefs? Chef Tarun shares his secret recipe.
Ingredients
Brioche bread 225 gms
Poached eggs 186 gms
Veal bacon 33 gms Hollandaise sauce 60 gms
Lollo rosso lettuce 10 gms Chive tips 1 gm Lemon dressing 5 gms
Method
• Slice and butter the brioche bread. Grill the veal bacon and remove the excess fat by dabbing with absorbent kitchen paper.
• Toast the buttered brioche.
• Top the buttered brioche with poached egg.
• Spread the hollandaise evenly over the eggs.
• Serve garnished with a sprig of chive and lollo rosso leaves.
Poached eggs
Eggs 195 gms
Water 1,000 gms
Salt 2 gms
White vinegar 20 gms
Method
• In deep-bottom sauce pan bring water to a rolling boil.
• Reduce the flame to simmer.
• Gently create a whirlpool in the sauce pan using the back of a spoon, and crack egg into middle.
• Once done, remove the eggs and use accordingly.
Hollandaise Ingredients
Eggs 120 gms
Clarified butter at
room temperature 500 gms
Lemon juice 25 gms
Salt 3 gms
White pepper 4 gms
• Prepare a double boiler.
• Separate the yolks from the whites. Tip them into a scrupulously clean mixing bowl with 5 gms of lemon juice and place the bowl on top of a double boiler.
• Whisk egg yolks, ensuring that the temperature of the eggs yolks is slightly more than 37 degree Celsius, but never much hotter than that.
• A minute into whisking the yolks, gently tip the melted clarified butter in a steady constant stream. Once the sauce has thickened remove the mixing bowl from the double boiler, season and tip in the remainder of the lemon juice.
• Now, give yourself a pat on your back and relax, because you’ve just managed to crack the most intimidating sauce.
Top Tip: Keep removing the mixing bowl from the double boiler to prevent the yolks from getting too hot. Do not stop whisking while the bowl is off the double boiler. Do not tip all the clarified butter in one go, remember a ‘steady constant stream’.
Eggs Benedict’s humble origins
Many people lay claim to devising eggs Benedict.
Lemuel Benedict, a retired Wall Street stock broker, claimed that he had wandered into the Waldorf Hotel in New York city in 1894 and, hoping to find a cure for his late night revelry, ordered buttered toast, poached eggs and Hollandaise. Oscar Tschirky the famed maître d’hôtel, was so impressed with the dish that he put it on the breakfast and luncheon menus, but substituted an English muffin for the toast.
The rest is brunching history.
