Breakfast Tart for Easy Entertaining

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Breakfast, Easy Entertaining, eggs, food, Life, Lifestyle, News, Photography, Recipe Food Blog Cook books Travel Writing, Rocket, spinach

There are a lot of hungry mouths to feed for breakfast. In the fridge I have rocket, spinach and feta and in the pantry fresh farm eggs and in the deep freezer the ever handy puff pastry. All these ingredients will not only make a delicious breakfast, but will also solve the problem of feeding a crowd, and  what’s more it takes only about 20 minutes to prepare, then into the oven for about half an hour to bake.

Breakfast tart of Eggs, Spinach, Rocket & Feta Cheese

Serves 6

Ingredients

80 g butter coarsely chopped

1 leek, thinly sliced

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

600 g spinach, trimmed and coarsely chopped

80 g rocket, coarsely chopped

150 g feta crumbled

150 g ricotta

30 ml each coarsely chopped thyme and oregano

Grated zest of 1 lemon

Puff pastry, ready made

100 ml buttermilk or cream

9 eggs

Olive oil, for drizzling 

Method

Preheat the oven to 180C.

In a pan melt half the butter and sauté the leek and garlic until they start to caramelise; then add the spinach and rocket, cook until wilted, then transfer mixture to a colander and drain.

Place the wilted greens in a bowl; add feta, ricotta, herbs, and lemon zest. Season to taste, mix and set aside.

Roll out the pastry to fit a 20cm x 29cm baking tray or tart tin. Melt the remaining butter, brush the base and sides line with the pastry, allowing pastry to overhang. Spread filling mixture over pastry base, make 6 evenly spaced indentations in filling and set aside.

In a bowl or jug, whisk buttermilk and 3 eggs to combine, season, then pour over spinach mixture. Crack remaining eggs in to the indentations, season each egg lightly and drizzle with olive oil. Brush the pastry edges with a little melted butter or milk.

Place tart in oven, bake for about 25 minutes until the pastry is cooked and the eggs are set.

Serve with some bacon and or tomato relish, and as it is the festive season, perhaps a little Champaign too.

Where Have All The Good Eggs Gone…?

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Bacon, Black Pepper, Breakfast, Brunch, Cape Town, Chefs, cooking, Country Living, Egg yolk, eggs, Eggs Benedict, Entertainment, Food and Wine, Food Blogs, Gourmet, Hollandaise sauce, Muffin (English), Poached egg, recipe, S.A. Food Blogs, Salt, Vinegar

Trying to find really fresh eggs is becoming as scarce as hens’ teeth. The eggs on offer are usually more than a week old, the whites runny and the yolk flattened. A fresh egg should have a rounded plump yolk, the white should have a thick gelatinous layer that clings all-round the yolk, followed by a thinner outer layer. After one week the yolk is flatter and the two separate textures of white are not quite so visible.

I am yet to be satisfied with the disappointing supply of eggs which the local supermarkets are selling; they are old and miserable in every way, literally falling apart as you crack the egg open. There is absolutely no visible difference between the two white textures in fact the whites are runny, barely able to hold the now very flat yolk, in most cases actually falling away from the egg yolk.

It is impossible to poach stale eggs, so when these gorgeously fresh beauties arrived from a good organic, free ranging happy chicken source, I could not resist and made this treat of deliciously oozing poached eggs on toast with a fancy name.

Eggs Benedict served with Bacon on Toasted Muffin

Serves 1

Ingredients

For the sauce

30 ml white wine vinegar

1 bay leaf

75 g butter

1 extra large egg yolk

1 tsp. lemon juice

Salt

Other ingredients

1-2 eggs

2 rashers of back bacon

1 English muffin split in half

Salt and black pepper to taste

Method

In a small pan simmer the vinegar with the Bay leaf until the vinegar is reduced by half, remove the bay leaf and leave the vinegar to cool. Melt the butter but do not boil, and leave to cool to blood heat.

A hand held blender is best for such a small quantity; place the egg yolk, lemon juice and a pinch of salt in a suitable bowl and blend until frothy, pour in the butter in a steady stream alternating with the vinegar until both are incorporated, and a thick creamy sauce has formed. Adjust the seasoning.

Grill the bacon, soft poach the eggs in a pan of simmering water, and toast the muffin.

To assemble

Place the bacon onto the toasted muffin, top with the well-drained poached egg and drizzle with some Hollandaise sauce, season with salt and pepper.

Enjoy the moment, I did.