Consider this: the best baked eggs don’t ever hit the oven. When testing these recipes, I found that simply adding a lid produces a humid atmosphere for cooking the egg tops, yielding tender soft-cooked egg with firm whites and flowing center. The intense, dry heat from baking is much more aggressive than steam, often leading to dry everything out resulting in firm yolks. Here are two sauce options to get started, but get creative. One is a super-simple coconut turmeric blend, whereas the spicy sausage sauce reimagines traditional spicy eggs, or, to the likes of you and me, eggs cooked in zesty tomato base.
Golden Coconut Sauce Baked Eggs (shown above)
Preparation 10 min
Cooking time 55 minutes
Serves Two people
Olive oil
1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
Fine sea salt
Two garlic cloves, crushed and chopped
10g fresh ginger, minced ginger
Turmeric powder
Toasted cumin
Aromatic leaves
Coconut milk
Canned chickpeas
Basil leaves, with more for garnish
4 eggs
Fresh chilies, finely sliced, to serve
Heat a cast-iron pan at moderate-high temperature. Drizzle olive oil, toss in the onion seasoned with salt, sauté for several minutes. Mix in garlic, ginger, and spices, let them sizzle, mixing now and then for a few minutes, then tip in the coconut milk including chickpea can contents. Heat until boiling, then turn down to a simmer, and leave it to tick over for half an hour, when sauce is rich and yellow. Add salt to taste, then stir in the basil leaves.
Use the back of a spoon forming small wells within the sauce, add eggs individually. Season eggs lightly salted, cover the skillet, gently heat for a few minutes, until egg whites firm and yolks warmed. Take off the heat, finish with a few extra basil leaves and thinly sliced finger chillies, and serve.
Spicy Sausage Sauce and Pickled Peppers Steamed Eggs
Preparation Quick prep
Cooking time 45 minutes
Yields 2
Oil
2 merguez-style lamb sausages
Spicy paste
1 tsp cumin seeds
Garlic cloves, sliced thin
400g good-quality tinned tomatoes
Fine sea salt
4 eggs
Pickled peppers, roughly chopped
1 small handful fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
Creamy yogurt
Fresh lemon, wedge-cut, for serving
Heat a skillet at moderate temperature. Pour in oil when heated, remove the skins from the sausages forming small bits of the meat into the pan, like mini balls. Reduce heat, cook until golden, extracting spicy fats. Move sausage pieces as they cook, so they colour on all sides.
Once browned, incorporate harissa, cumin, and garlic to the pot, turn up the heat to medium and cook, stirring, for several minutes, until aromatic, and garlic softens. Add tomatoes, salt to taste let it bubble. Lower to gentle simmer and leave to blip away for twenty minutes. Ragu thickens, become richer and darker, with oils separating and surfacing.
Employ utensil to create four little pockets in the sauce, then crack an egg into each. Dust with salt with a little salt, place lid on pan. Cook for two to three minutes gently, when eggs set with yolks runny.
Remove from heat, garnish with peppers, herbs, yogurt dollop, and oil splash, accompanied by lemon.
