Duck eggs benedict
Stop the presses, we’ve written a cookbook! In the FavorFlav cookbook, The 100 Best Dishes You Must Have Eaten, we’re giving you all our favorite foolproof recipes. Great, right? It’s in stores now, but FavorFlav’s Emma, Renée and Marcus have each selected their personal favorite for you, which you can read here in advance.
It’s simply a fact. Our first and only real FavorFlav cookbook, The 100 Best Dishes You Must Have Eaten, is in stores. It makes me proud that, as an editorial team, we managed to write, test, rewrite and retest no fewer than one hundred recipes, and so on. With a title like that, you have to be more than certain of your work. Believe me, we are. Of course, I’m anything but impartial in this story, but if you don’t come away from leafing through this book drooling, something is seriously wrong with you.
Childhood memories
It’s magical to see your own dishes in all their glory in a cookbook. Many of my recipes are connected to particular places, people and memories. The Russian salad, for example, came from a search for a flavor I remember from my childhood. My grandmother made the very best, and everyone in the village knew it. Though the dish also reminds me of my grandmother, who, while cooking, would suddenly put a whole boiled egg in her mouth, followed by a spoonful of mayonnaise. Both my grandmother and my mother have always had a knack for making me laugh with things like that.
Duck Eggs Café
Duck eggs benedict is another such dish. My brother lives in London and knows everything there is to know about good food at any conceivable time of day. When he lived in Brixton years ago, he took me to Duck Eggs Café: a somewhat ramshackle-looking place that you could easily walk right past. As the name suggests, they serve all kinds of dishes with duck eggs here, from a full English to eggs forestière and, of course, duck eggs benedict.
This minimal adaptation of an otherwise extremely classic dish is an invention worth writing home about. Duck eggs have enormous yolks— the runnier the egg yolk, the better—and, in addition, they have a higher fat content than chicken eggs, which pairs wonderfully with the rich, slightly tangy hollandaise sauce. To cut a long story short: anyone who still makes eggs benedict with regular eggs is doing themselves a disservice, hence this recipe. You’re welcome. You can buy duck eggs at the market or at an Asian grocery store.
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 225 °C. For the hollandaise sauce, melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat. Clarify the butter by skimming off the foamy, protein-rich layer with a slotted spoon.
2. Whisk the 4 egg yolks until light and airy in a stainless-steel bowl with half the lemon juice, the water and the mustard. Place the bowl in a pan of hot (not boiling) water and heat the egg yolks slowly and gradually over low heat. The temperature must not rise above 60 °C, otherwise the egg will set. Whisk the egg yolks with a whisk until they thicken and you have a smooth, thick and creamy mixture. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk the clarified butter into the egg mixture a splash at a time until you have a smooth sauce. Wait each time until the butter has been fully incorporated before adding more. Season the sauce with lemon juice, salt and pepper. Keep the sauce warm in a thermos flask. Alternatively, use the stainless-steel bowl, cover it with plastic wrap and place it in a pan of warm water. The sauce is served lukewarm.
3. Poach the duck eggs. Heat water in a tall, deep pan until just below boiling point. Add the vinegar. Crack an egg into a small cup. Use a ladle to create a large whirlpool in the center of the pan and quickly slide the egg from the cup into the whirlpool. Cook the egg for another 3 to 4 minutes, until the white has set but the yolk is still soft. Set the egg aside on a plate and repeat with the remaining eggs.
4. Meanwhile, halve the bread rolls and arrange them cut-side up on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Brush the rolls with butter and toast them in the oven for 6 minutes until golden brown. Divide the ham over the rolls and bake in the oven for another 3 minutes.
5. Divide the toast with the ham among 4 plates. Place a poached egg on each piece of toast and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Finally, carefully spoon the hollandaise sauce over the top and garnish with the chives and cayenne pepper.
Title: The 100 Best Dishes You Must Have Eaten
Authors: Marcus Polman, Renée Conradi, Emma de Thouars
Publisher: Carrera
Price: €27.50 (introductory price)
