Day 6: yogurt ‘n’ eggs

I want to like eggs. I really do. In fact, I do - I am just fussy as to how I eat them. I love the yolk, but won’t make myself, nor order when out, an egg just to indulge in the yolk and then leave the whites - food wastage is one of my biggest pet peeves. I love the classics; egg-mayonnaise with watercress, on soft white bouncy bread and the retro-fabulous devilled egg. I also enjoy them in Polish-style salads, again also featuring mayonnaise. I admire the concept of, and have even on occasion made them myself for guests, the popular tomato-based approach to serving eggs for breakfast in the form of huevos rancheros. But, still, aside from the delight in a quick dunk of toasted sourdough into the vibrantly, rich and creamy yolk and then a messy mop up of the spicy tomato sauce - I have little enthusiasm for the ‘whole’ egg.

If I take a minute to think about it actually, it’s pretty obvious the only time I really enjoy eggs is when mayonnaise is featured, and while yogurt is no substitute in any realm for mayonnaise - the concept of poached eggs in a pool of garlicky yogurt seems utterly divine. Especially when one proposes to add melted, chili-butter and a wedge, or two, of toasted sour dough to the equation.

Nigella’s Turkish Eggs

I actually saw this for the first time on the At My Table television show, and subsequently, dreamily gazed at the picture in the book for many years to pass. My husband was convinced he wouldn’t like this. He’s not into sour cream, despite hailing from a nation that uses it daily in their cuisine, and feels plain Greek yogurt echoes a very similar taste, and smell.

After finally remembering to obtain some Aleppo pepper, in all it's citrussy heat, it was finally time to make this dish. I’m pretty rubbish at cooking poached eggs. I mean, they come out with a nice yolk but the white is all over the place like one of those jellyfish with the long tentacles. So, here I decided to follow Nigella’s method step by step and while, initially, I thought this seemed like a bit of a fiddle - it actually wasn’t. The result - two pretty flawless poached eggs. Everything from the gentle relaxation of stirring the warming yogurt and garlic in its bain-marie, to the step-by-step method of poaching the eggs - and knowing they’d be far more satisfying than my usual attempts, to the joy of the red frothing when you add the Aleppo pepper to the hazelnut-tinted melted butter, made this breakfast a delight to cook. Aside from finding joy in the cooking, we must also find it in the eating too - and these eggs delivered just that.

Flavour musings

Aleppo pepper, I think, is a new thing for me. I have no doubt that I have eaten it within Turkish cuisine before and it has probably been the culprit of a flavour I couldn’t identify. To smell, I think it has a certain fruity-earthiness to it, and then to eat - an earthy, citrus tang with gentle heat, which weds perfectly with the sour garlickiness of the yogurt and the creaminess of the butter and egg yolk. Bonus here - I didn’t even notice the egg whites!