French Provincial Cooking - Elizabeth David [105]
There are still plenty of lovely egg dishes of a much simpler kind to be made at home; with constant practice and given the time, it is perfectly possible to poach a few eggs successfully; an omelette is very easily made, in spite of all the talk about light hands and heavy frying pans; and once you know the trick, the shelling of œufs mollets is quite easy, provided you have a steady hand.
I shall try to explain these things, and others connected with the successful manipulation of eggs, for they are well worth the practice needed and the time and money you must spend. From unsuccessful attempts there is much to be learnt, so one must count an occasional wasted egg or failed soufflé as profit rather than loss. Egg dishes have a kind of elegance, a freshness, an allure, which sets them quite apart from any other kind of food, so that it becomes a great pleasure to be able to cook them properly and to serve them in just the right condition.
Eggs in their own right, as well as all those allied dishes such as the onion tarts of Alsace, the cream and bacon quiches of Lorraine and all the various cheese and egg, potato and cream, and hot pastry confections of the different provinces of France which come under the heading of hot hors-d’œuvre make the best possible dishes to serve as a first course at luncheon on the occasions when something hot is required. But it cannot be claimed that these are particularly light dishes. Eggs, and especially eggs with cheese or cream, are very filling. So if you are starting with a soufflé, or an onion tart, or a pipérade, it is best to make the second course something not too rich, and certainly not one requiring an egg or cream sauce.
ŒUFS À LA COQUE
BOILED EGGS
Although eggs are cooked in such a variety of exquisite ways by French cooks, the ordinary boiled egg is not their strong point. One would be lucky, I think, to get boiled eggs as good as those described by Henry James after a luncheon at Bourg-en-Bresse, which was composed entirely of boiled eggs and bread and butter. ‘They were so good that I am ashamed to say how many of them I consumed.’ An œuf à /a coque in fact usually means, in France, an egg plunged in boiling water, taken out again, and there you are. But Madame St. Ange, thorough in this matter as in all others, gives no less than five different methods of boiling an egg in her incomparable Livre de Cuisine, starting off her chapter on eggs with the remark that a ‘true boiled egg must have been laid the day it is to be eaten.’ Not an easy rule to observe, but certainly few people will quarrel with the rule that an egg more than three days old had better be cooked some other way.
Here are the Saint-Ange methods, summarised:
(1) Allowing pint of water for 2 eggs, bring it to the boil in a fairly deep saucepan. Off the fire, lower the eggs into the water in a tablespoon. Cover the pan and cook 4 minutes without further boiling.
(2) Put the eggs into a saucepan; cover them plentifully with cold water. When the water reaches a full boil, the eggs are cooked. Remove them at once.
(3) Bring a saucepan of water to the boil; remove from the fire to put in the eggs. Cover the pan. Put back on the fire. From the moment the water comes to the boil again allow 3 minutes. If the eggs are very large leave them a further minute off the fire.
(4) Plunge the eggs into the pan of boiling water. Taking it immediately from the fire, keep it closely covered for 10 minutes.
(5) Plunge the eggs into boiling water. Cover; leave one minute over the fire. Remove from the fire and leave 5 minutes.
From all these alternatives everyone should surely be able to choose that which suits them best. Personally,