Monday, May 20, 2013
By Meredith Goad mgoad@mainetoday.com
Staff Writer
Why is it that, when it comes to food, moms get all the love?
Poached eggs on hash
Dana Moos photo
BREAKFAST PIE
My sister-in-law makes this easy, guy-friendly breakfast pie at family gatherings. I’ve served it at brunches, and it’s always a hit. Make sure you use a deep dish crust or the filling will overflow.
Servings: Six to eight
1-pound package premium pork roll sausage
1 frozen or from-scratch deep dish pie shell
1 1/2 cups grated Swiss cheese
1/2 cup chopped green pepper
2 tablespoons chopped onion
4 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup milk or light cream
Salt and pepper
Cook sausage until done, crumble and drain. Mix cheese and sausage and put in pie shell. Lightly beat eggs. Combine remaining ingredients and add to eggs. Pour mixture into shell over sausage. Bake at 375 degrees for 40 to 45 minutes.
POACHED EGGS ON HASH
From Dana Moos’ “The Art of Breakfast”
“This is my breakfast version of a loaded baked potato!” Moos says. “Delicious as a brunch or light dinner as well.”
Servings: Four
1 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon white truffle oil (Moos uses Fiore)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon fresh chopped chives, plus more
for garnish
4 strips thick-cut (hardwood smoked) bacon, diced
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 large Vidalia (or sweet) onion, diced
2 large Yukon Gold potatoes, cubed
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 cup shredded sharp white cheddar cheese
1/4 cup white vinegar
8 eggs
1 (10-ounce) package of fresh baby spinach
1. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees.
2. In a small bowl, mix together the sour cream, truffle oil, salt and chives, and set aside.
3. In a large saute pan, cook the bacon over medium heat until crisp, about 10 to 12 minutes, and remove with a slotted spoon. Set aside. To the same pan, add the olive oil and saute the onions and potatoes until tender and the onions are lightly caramelized, about 15 to 18 minutes. Add the paprika, toss in the bacon, top with shredded cheddar, and keep covered in the oven.
4. Fill a shallow saute pan (2 to 3 quarts) three-fourths of the way up with water and add the white vinegar. Bring to a slow rolling boil.
5. Crack one egg into a small bowl and lower into the boiling water. Repeat with the next 7 eggs. Cook for 3 to 4 minutes for a softer yolk. Remove the eggs and place in a bowl of warm water to keep warm.
6. When ready to serve, remove the eggs from the warm water with a slotted spoon and place on a paper towel. To plate, put a small amount of baby spinach on each plate. Top with the potato hash, 2 poached eggs, and a tablespoon or two of the sour cream mixture. Garnish with fresh chopped chives.
On Mother's Day, mom always gets breakfast in bed or brunch out at a nice restaurant. It makes no difference if she has the parenting skills of Dina Lohan or that crazy neo-Nazi lady who named her child Adolf Hitler and pretty much ruined his life in the first five seconds.
No matter what, Mom's gonna get some eggs scrambled by somebody else.
Fathers? Fathers not only get no stuffed French toast or eggs Benedict, they are expected to fire up the grill and feed us.
And while they are grilling the steaks, they are forced to open cute cards that make fun of their lawn care skills, tag them as easy marks for scoring some extra cash, and label them lazy if they want to take a half hour for themselves in the recliner with a beer and a rerun of "The Simpsons" instead of chauffeuring you and your creepy boyfriend to the mall.
This year, why not give your dad what he really wants?
Breakfast meats.
Hash browns or any other form of fried potato, as long as it's greasy and comes with ketchup on the table.
Runny eggs oozing over a steaming pile of corned beef hash.
You know, manly food. The kind of guilt-inducing, artery-clogging fare that June Cleaver put on Ward's plate.
Go ahead, it's only one day. You can force-feed him a green smoothie on Monday.
Need some ideas? I asked a cookbook author and a few chefs what they would serve, or would like to be served, on Father's Day.
Dana Moos' manly dish is topped with truffled sour cream, but it contains three of the man-food food groups -- potatoes, bacon and cheese -- and tastes like something every dad loves: A loaded baked potato.
Moos is the innkeeper/breakfast cook at the Pomegranate Inn in Portland and the author of "The Art of Breakfast" (Down East Books, $28.95). Known for her creative breakfasts, Moos says she's noticed that men tend to like anything with cinnamon.
"The women tend to like the savory dishes more," she said. "The men tend to like a baked French toast. Guys tend to like cinnamon."
Guys also love poached eggs, and so does Moos, so she created a potato hash dish that is sure to satisfy Dad on Sunday. You can find her recipe for poached eggs on potato, onion and bacon hash at right.
"I cook the cubed potatoes and onions with some raw bacon, and they all cook together, but then I also save some bacon for garnish on top of the sour cream," Moos said. "And then I use Cabot cheddar that I shred by hand, so it's really good sharp cheddar, and then fresh chives on top of the sour cream. And it does taste like a loaded baked potato."
Mom needs to do the chopping, but Moos said kids can help with dumping, piling and putting stuff in bowls, along with (depending on their ages) cracking the eggs and mixing the sour cream and truffle oil.
Chefs love it when their kids get busy in the kitchen to make them something special for Father's Day. Tony Poulin, a chef instructor at Southern Maine Community College and father to a 9-year-old daughter and 4-year-old son, says his perfect Father's Day meal would be "fresh Maine sea scallops, prepared any way."
Mitchell Kaldrovich, chef at Sea Glass at Inn by the Sea in Cape Elizabeth and father of a 2-year-old daughter (and another daughter on the way), thinks a Croque Monsieur would please dad and be easy for a child to make.
(Continued on page 2)
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If his young boys were to make his Father’s Day breakfast, said chef Steve Corry of Five Fifty-Five and Petite Jacqueline, it would probably be something along the lines of a Croque Madame “just because the kids love grilled cheese sandwiches.” Courtesy photo |
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