Wednesday, November 30, 2011
SUNNY side-up eggs? Scrambled eggs? Hard or soft-boiled eggs?
These are the three most common ways of preparing eggs as far as I can remember while I was growing up. And I bet all of you will agree with me. Since this “lowly” egg is the easiest and fastest to prepare, be it for breakfast, lunch, dinner or snacks in between. And we are talking about chicken eggs.
Eaten as it is, with bread or rice, it is enough to fill our tummy till our next real meal. I know I like eating this with catsup. Although as I was growing up, I started to like my scrambled eggs with fresh tomato chunks or slices or onions with a little soy sauce or salt for that added taste. Although I learned later on that adding a little cream or milk can really make the eggs creamier and richer in taste.
I am sure a lot of you have also added other “ingredients” like sardines or tuna, ham, cheese, hotdog, mushroom, potatoes, assorted vegetables and the like to come up with a delectable omelet which itself becomes a complete dish.
Normally, we call it omelet or just scrambled egg. But in Italy, they call it Frittata (made with pasta). In Spain, they call it Tortilla (sounds familiar?). In France, they call it Quiche (which is baked) although they would have a pastry layer on the bottom before adding the egg mixture and is regarded as the savory version of the sweet custard pie or tart.
Growing up, I also learned that we also cook scrambled egg with added green onions and some ground pork with salt and pepper. But this is neither fried nor baked, but steamed. Chinese-style, I should say.
Beating the eggs and incorporating more air would definitely make the egg batter fluffier and lighter. Depending on my mood, I would sometimes even want my scrambled eggs lightly beaten so that when cooked, I could still see and taste the yolks and white separately.
For soups, who would not have heard of egg drop soup or hot and sour soup? These would be of Chinese or Oriental origin which everybody seemed to like, especially with those commercially prepared packs of soup where one has to just mix and boil in water, add one egg and voila! The soup is done!
Eggs here are not totally scrambled so that one get to see the yellow and the white strands of the eggs when poured slowly in the thickened soup. And for that “Asian” touch, you can add a few drops of sesame oil or black vinegar.
What about those noodle soups we buy? Instead of just adding the spices included in the package, why not add an egg? That should give you more nutrition. Of course, lomi will not be lomi without eggs. So is batchoy.
In fried rice, it would be delicious to have sliced scrambled eggs on it, although I must admit, just adding the whole egg to the rice mixture saves a lot of time. But might need more eggs to be noticed in the rice dish, which I totally like! Arroz Valenciana, Arroz a la Cubana and many other rice specialties also uses eggs, but normally boiled, sliced and garnished on top of it.
Noodle dishes also uses a lot of eggs. Say, our very own pancit palabok and birthday noodles (pancit, bihon, misua, etc.). And don’t forget, eggs are used in the preparation of pasta /noodles itself.
Sandwiches! We have egg sandwich, ham and egg, egg and cheese, burger with egg, and the very famous clubhouse sandwich, to name a few. But these are mostly fried or scrambled.
French toast, on the other hand, uses bread slices that are then dipped in scrambled egg with added sweetness like honey, milk and cinnamon before being fried in butter or oil. This can then be served as a breakfast treat if served with bacon or ham and eggs or snacks or after meal dessert when served with fruits, fruit puree, ice cream, chocolate syrup, cream and nuts.
See how versatile the eggs can be? And we have not touch on the uses of eggs in baking and other dessert preparation yet!
But then, eggs are high in protein (essential amino acids), vitamins (A, riboflavin, folic acid, B6, B12) and minerals (iron, calcium, phosphorus, potassium) and supply our daily needs of protein and fats needed by our bodily functions.
Again, moderation is the key to a healthy body and a good state of mind!
(Email: potsnpans1976@yahoo.com; website: www.potsnpans1976.weebly.com)
Published in the Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro newspaper on December 01, 2011.
No comments:
Post a Comment