Every week, only in LIFE
Eggs are called the breakfast of champions for a very good reason, says Rachel Allen, who has some truly eggs-cellent recipes for you to try. Photography by Tony Gavin
Rumour has it that Albert Einstein liked to fry his breakfast eggs in butter, before adding a teaspoon of honey into the pan to create a silky-sweet glaze. Alexa Chung likes hers scrambled, sitting on top of mashed feta and avo (the so 2016 way to say avocado), and when the servants of flamboyant entertainer Liberace were having a day off, he would make a meal of baked eggs for himself by cooking them in a ramekin with cream and grated cheese.
However you fancy yours, eggs are, of course, the ultimate fast food. Not a day goes by when I don’t crack one open for an omelette, cake or even a salad. The only thing better than a croquemonsieur isa croque-madame, which is the classic French ham-and-cheese sandwich, but with a fried egg on top. I adore the Middle Eastern one-pot dish shakshouka (which literally means ‘a mixture’), where eggs are cooked in a spicy tomato sauce. In Marrakech, I loved mopping up the runny yolk and sauce with pitta and hummus. Happily, now there are many places to enjoy this dish in Ireland — my local being the lovely cafe at Stephen Pearce pottery in Shanagarry, east Cork.
In Istanbul, I couldn’t start the day without menemen, a traditional Turkish dish also containing tomatoes, peppers and eggs. Sometimes the eggs were lightly scrambled, or at other times they were left whole, like in a shakshouka, but with lots of crumbled feta and mint over the top, as in the photograph, above left. My favourite place to eat menemen in Dublin is at the wonderful Brother Hubbard in Dublin’s Capel Street and Harrington St (see brotherhubbard.ie) where it’s served scrambled-style, topped with herbs, red onion and cloudlike whipped feta.
Owners Garrett Fitzgerald and James Boland have said that there would be riots if they took it off the menu, and I’m not at all surprised.
And as for Albert Einstein’s honey-fried eggs — well, I guess it’s lucky he stuck with the physics.