A Story About Eggy Bread

What if French toast could be improved by the Brits?

27th Apr 2009

Eggy bread, a slice of white loaf dipped in egg whisked with milk and fried in butter, is simply French toast without the sweetness.  It is a food I've consumed in countless American diners, and on countless Sunday mornings as a kid.  But that morning I found eggy bread unrecognizable without its sheen of maple syrup and its fragrant nutmeg and cinnamon spices.  Still, there it was, plain and o...

Real Homemade American Bacon

How to smoke pork belly at home.

2nd Jul 2008

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First, I needed to find some pork belly with its skin still firmly on. My previous attempt removed it , along with a lot of precious fat directly underneath.  My bacon didn't have nearly enough fat on it to fry up, so instead cooking up beautifully in a pan, it burned .  My local butcher wouldn't sell me a piece with the skin on unless I bought 10 pounds, a fact I still find ridicu...

Hamine Eggs: The Search for the Perfect Hard-Boiled Egg

A different method for hard boiling eggs.

30th Apr 2008

And what better place to find proof than Harold McGee?  His On Food and Cooking had a whole section on long cooked eggs.  He calls them “an intriguing alternative” which can be cooked for anywhere between “6 to 18 hours.”  Still no recipe, but I’m finally on to something.  The most interesting aspect about the process is what happens to the flavor, which he says generates “flavo...

How to Throw a Successful Tapas Party

In which we find a wildly handsome Spanish man

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Step 1: Find a Spanish Man.

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Step 2: Find a Spanish Ham.

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Preferably, a wildly handsome Spanish friend with a hunk of Spanish ham that his mother sent him.  Jorge had looks.  And he had the ham.   What follows is an evening of many, many stages that included overcoming fears of anchovies, quail eggs, and two romantic party members who ate their share, doted on each other, and c...

Aged Goat Cheese Omelette With Thyme

This is what happens when you start cooking before you’ve put in 30 seconds to check if you actually have what you need.

25th Jan 2006

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When I can’t decide what I feel like cooking, I’ll often visit epicurious.com and bum around until an ingredient that sounds great pops up--then I’ll start searching for that ingredient and I always find something that sounds tasty.  In this case, my ingredient was goat cheese.  I was doing a few searches at www.jamieoliver.com --we basically follow him and his British humor around with to...