Little Brown Egg How Lovely You Are | Cooking Stories

Little Brown Egg, How Lovely You Are

Something needs to be said on behalf of the perfect brown egg. Just look at these beauties, so round and smooth. Yes, I carried them home with me from the grocery store, swaddled them in a kitchen towel and snapped their picture. Mother Hen would be proud to know that her unborn children had a brief modeling career before they met with their destiny in my egg salad sandwich.

One of my friends dislikes eggs and egg-based foods, and I can't imagine how this can be so. If there were such a thing as an Eggitarian, I would be one. I enjoy a plain soft-boiled egg just as much as I love sinking my teeth into a rich, dense slice of sausage, Swiss and artichoke quiche, in all its flaky-crusty, eggy goodness. And I do love the complexity of Egg Foo Young (shrimp is my favorite) - one of the most underrated and possibly most undeservedly ridiculed items on the Chinese Takeout Menu. Egg is a true chameleon, taking on the flavor of whatever ingredients you pair it with... yet somehow holding its own, unmistakably egg. Bechamel sauce, though I've never made it, ranks high on my list of savory, eggy delights, followed by tangy Hollandaise which makes the Eggs Benedict eating experience everything it was meant to be.

Thoughts on egg-based desserts: Give me a lightly sweetened, creamy, eggy vanilla pudding, or a slab of coconut custard pie that "eats like a meal," over chocolate cake anyday. Don't get me wrong... I've moaned in ecstasy over melt-in-your-mouth chocolate decadence, but if given the choice I'd take a bite of the chocolate and pass up the rest in favor of a hearty, stick-to-your-ribs eggy dessert. Like creme brulee. Our beloved Ann brought up creme brulee the other day, and to me that's just another amazing, egg-based culinary creation, a smooth sheet of quivering custard coated with melt-in-your-mouth carmelized sugar.

And don't even get me started on omelettes. Eggs whisked well with a splash of milk, cooked lightly in butter, blanketing a layer of delicately sauteed mushrooms and onion, smothered in Swiss cheese. A delicate spinach and mozzarella frittata, served with slices of fresh beefsteak tomato and crusty bread. Crabmeat and monterey jack folded snugly into a happy yellow egg envelope and garnished with a sprig of cilantro. Fluffy fried egg, glistening with butter and sprinkled with a little salt and pepper... tucked in beside a slice of cheddar and resting between two halves of a warm, soft roll.

I rarely come across a soufflee, but it's only a matter of time before I attempt to make one at home, as this is another miraculous egg creation. Someone remind me to whisper and tiptoe about while my future soufflee is being birthed in the oven, as I tend to be a bull in a china shop no matter where I am. Did you know that marshmallow is made of egg? It's just meringe in a different incarnation. I once "made" marshmallow fluff at home using eggs, vanilla, sugar, and my Kitchen Aid mixer.

I even enjoy gazing at a bowl of six or so round and perfect golden egg yolks, quietly suspended in their own gellatinous egg-white protection.

Yes, I am an egg person, through and through. How about you?