Ode to the Egg

Lately, my lunch has been pretty predictable: grapes, cottage cheese, some crackers, a few slices of cheese and a hardboiled egg. If I’m feeling bold, I’ll make the egg into an egg salad sandwich. But I’m bold less often than not.

This morning I was making lunches and realized we were out of hardboiled eggs.

All day.

All day.

I have been thinking about that egg.

On my drive home I dreamed of many dinner menus involving eggs. Infront of the fridge I was so happy to indulge my craving. I gathered the following:

• mixed greens
• red, orange and green peppers
• cucumbers
• cherry tomatoes
• red onions
• a wedge each of feta
• a little hill of fresh cracked pepper; and
• a few eggs.

This promising collection of ingredients became a beautiful salad, but really it’s the egg I’ve been thinking about. At this point a hardboiled egg just wasn’t going to cut it. In my head I saw a beautifully poached egg. Only one problem – I’ve never poached an egg.

Well, today was the day.

Finally, I sat down and atop my salad bowl sat a gently poached egg, white and swollen. Happily, I punctured the egg and its yellow yolk spilled onto the tangle of mixed greens below.

Sacred Saturday Mornings

Our weekends are usually pretty packed. Between family and friends we never seem to have an empty night. We often get nostalgic and ask each other “hey remember that weekend we did nothing but watch cake challenges on the food network?” “That was a good weekend”.

I’m okay with the busy nights, but Ryan is wired differently. He gets quite twitchy when we don’t have a free night in sight. To compromise (since I am usually the one jam packing our schedule with dinner dates) we try very hard to keep our Saturday and Sunday mornings free. They’ve become sacred really.

We have a routine; whoever wakes first goes to the couch and waits for the other to come with the pillows and quilt. We have a bigger brunch – usually carb filled and curl up on the couch trying to catch up on the shows on the pvr.

This weekend was no different. Saturday morning we met on the couch and caught up on a couple episodes of amazing race while eating Molly Wizenberg’s Scottish Scones.

½ c milk
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
zest of 1 lemon
½ tsp salt
½ stick (2 ounces) unsalted butter, cubed and chilled
3 tbs sugar

preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Beat together the milk and the egg and then set aside. In a large bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt. Rub the butter into the flour mixture, working until you have no lumps bigger than a pea. Add the sugar and lemon zest, and stir to mix. pour the wet ingredients into the dry, reserving just a tad of the milk-egg mixture to use as a glaze. Bring dough together gently with a wooden spoon.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured counter and knead it no more than 12 times. Pat dough into a round approximately ½-inch thick, and cut into 8 or 12 wedges. place on an ungreased baking sheet. Using a pastry brush, glaze wedges.

Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until golden.