With My Eyes Closed

 

Hello People!

 

No, i haven’t been away, it is only the turning of the earth that  has given you the illusion that time has passed, when i have been right here all along !

To go on, after much self-motivation and a lot coaxing from the beautiful Food maestros on twitter, i have participated in the Monthly Mingle -> Link Hosted by Jamie Schler Who blogs on Life’s A Feast an created by Meeta of What’s For Lunch !

 

The Theme Is France!

When The Husband and I lived in london, we had been to Paris a few times with family, and on our own as well, one of our cousins is completely in love with the city, and said she could smell the romance in the air, Unfortunately, our romance sniffing organ must have been on holiday in paris. We loved the noise, and busy streets, the amazing food, but the city of love, was never that for us.

Because we detest shopping, our highlights are  (the same as all our holidays) Food! The rarity of french restaurants in Abu Dhabi, forget ‘good’ french restaurants has made me forget the taste of the painstakingly prepared plates of art.

When i read the Monthly Mingle my love for the small baked bundles of heaven filled with custard and topped with chocolates jumped into my head! Eclairs ! for the first two years of my university, my breakfast was an eclair and a cup of hot chocolate from Dunkin Donuts. Though the time has passed, my love for eclairs has not diminished. And so i set out to make eclairs, and i tried, four times, and failed all four times.

Dejected and depressed, i scourged You Tube for an-easy french recipe, and i stumbled on to Laura Calder‘s Videos.

I think she is beautiful dynamic and makes complicated recipes sounds so simple, And one of her recipe vidoes showed me how to make a simple breakfast dish with amazing versatility for my fussy family that involved using Le Creueset pots that i got when i was in London.

 

Oeufs en Cocotte, or eggs en cocotte is a french dish that involves baking eggs in cream. I have adopted her recipe a little bit as per my taste and availability of ingredients!

Ingredients

40gm of butter

1 Egg per ramekin

Freshly milled salt and pepper to season

1 Tsp of Crème fraiche/ ramekin

1 Slice of bread / ramekin cut into vertical slices

Flavourings :

50gm of Smoked Salmon

25gm of Blue cheese

2 sprigs Parsley

50 gm of cut up chicken franks

Dill for decoration

 

Directions

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees

In each ramekin, put the flavourings in the bottom.

Break an egg on top of each flavouring careful not to break the yolk

Season with salt and pepper

Add a tsp of Crème fraiche on top of the egg white

Sprinkle some chopped Dill on top for more flavour

Bake the cocottes in a bain marie ( water bath) in the preheated oven for 15 min for runny and 18 min for a more firm egg.

Toast some bread in a pan or a toaster, spread some button on the bread

Serve Warm.

 

When the Crème fraiche melts, it spreads and combines with the seasonings and egg to create a beautiful picture.

It was easy and fun to do this recipe. I made the Veggie one for Adeeb because he avoids meat in the morning. The chicken for my sister in law, and smoked salmon for Ayaan and the Blue cheese for myself ofcourse

Until the Eggs are baked and the yolks colour your day !