Category: Eggs

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Deviled Chili Eggs

When I come home tired, still have to do taxes and deal with hours of annoying computer issue, and we’re out of leftovers, but I NEED a tasty hot dinner to fuel me — 20 minutes of cooking gets me chili eggs and rice. That’ll do.

Taxes and computer work done, bed now.

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I’m going to give you the recipe, but also the sequence for making the meal — hope this isn’t confusing. After a little practice, this is just about 20 minutes, start to finish.

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1) Start rice (I typically do 2 c. white rice, 4 c. water, a pinch of salt, bring to a boil, when it boils, turn down to a simmer, cover, and set timer for 15 minutes).

2) While rice is coming to a boil, start eggs (I typically do 8 eggs in enough water to cover, bring to a boil, when it comes to a boil, put on a lid, turn off heat, set timer for 15 minutes. You probably need a second timer, unless you’re very deft with your timings.)

3) Make chili eggs — recipe below:

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Deviled Chili Eggs
(20 minutes, serves 8.)

This is not what Westerners call deviled eggs! It’s one of the first dishes I learned to make; very simple, can be made quickly, terrific to serve to vegetarians, and adds a nice punch of pungent spice to your meal. As a bonus, the devilled onions are terrific as a condiment on their own, added to a grilled chicken sandwich, for example.

3 medium onions, sliced (feel free to buy sliced or diced onions if that makes your life easier; frozen diced onions work too, but have to cook a few more minutes to get the moisture out)
3 TBL vegetable oil
1 tsp black mustard seed
1 tsp cumin seed
2 TBL (less or more to taste) cayenne
3 TBL ketchup
1 rounded tsp salt
8 boiled eggs, peeled and sliced in half

1. While eggs are boiling, slice onions and sauté in oil on high with mustard seed and cumin seeds until onions are golden/translucent (not brown), stirring constantly (about 5 minutes).

2. Add cayenne and cook 1 minute. Immediately add ketchup and salt; stir until well blended and cooked through, about 3-5 more minutes. Remove from heat.

3. When egg timer goes off and eggs are cooked, cool eggs in cold running water, then shell and slice in half. Arrange on a plate and spoon chili onions over, turning gently to coat.

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4) When rice timer goes off, turn off rice. Serve hot with chili eggs.

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Egg Salad Tea Sandwich

I promised a tea party digital cookbook as a stretch goal on Vegan Serendib, and it’s been holding me up on starting a Kickstarter for Gluten-Free Serendib, so I’m trying very hard to finish that little cookbook up.

Which means making lots of tea sandwiches, because I apparently have no good photos of many of them, and some of them, I don’t even have recipes written down for. Pity me — I have to eat lots of delicious little sandwiches in the next few weeks…

The following is a very basic recipe — not particularly Sri Lankan! Though we do eat them — thanks, colonialism!

Egg salad tea sandwiches are much the same the world over, I suspect. I don’t usually use the curry powder for these myself.

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Egg Salad Tea Sandwich
(30 minutes, makes 16 tea sandwiches)

4 large eggs, hard-boiled and peeled
1/4 c. mayonnaise
2 T Dijon mustard
1/4 onion, diced
1 t. fresh chives, chopped
1/4 t. curry powder, optional
Salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
8 slices bread (I like multi-grain with egg salad, but wheat or white is fine)

1. Mash eggs with mayo and Dijon; a potato masher works well, but a fork is just fine.

2. Stir in onions and chives (reserving a small portion of chives for sprinkling at end), curry powder if using, salt, black pepper.

3. Spread egg salad on four slices of bread; top with other four slices.

4. Trim off edges, and then slice in quarters (use a damp paper towel to clean the knife before and between quartering cuts for a pristine appearance).

5. Sprinkle with chives and serve.

NOTE: Egg salad can be made a day in advance; it’s best to assemble sandwiches just before serving.

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Cute Little Quail Eggs

Cute little quail eggs, which I made for the Santa Fe retreat, planning to make Scotch eggs with them, aka nargisi kofta — and then I completely forgot them when packing! Alas!

It’s okay, they made good egg salad sandwiches when I got home…

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Instant pot egg bites

As we enter the season of fall baking (planning on baking pumpkin-chocolate mini-muffins later today, for Anand’s birthday party), I keep thinking about how we show love with food. The kids are so delighted when they come home and find surprise apple-cheddar crescent rolls; it’s very clearly a sign of love. And that’s fine, but at the same time, my family doesn’t do great, health-wise, if we have a ton of starches around (sweet or otherwise) — it’s so easy to reach for the easy carbs.

For the family, we try to always have fruit on hand; I just picked up a double-decker fruit basket, so we can fit even more out on the island. When the kids were younger, I did a lot of cutting up fruit for them, and I still do sometimes, to encourage them to eat it, but at this point, they’ve learned to like it enough that they just grab it and either bite into it, or cut it up themselves.

I haven’t quite gotten them to liking hummus yet (must work on that again), but sometimes when they come home from school, it’s a plate of veggies with ranch that’s waiting for them, and they’ll happily snack on that if it’s out. The specific veggies the kids like does vary over time, which is a little frustrating! But thankfully, they are consistently fans of bell pepper, so there’s at least one raw veg. I can count on them eating. They also like cooked broccoli. Bell pepper and broccoli are on a very steady rotation around here. Yes, it’s boring, but needs must.

For myself, I’m trying really hard to prep more healthy options on the weekend, to make busy weeks easier. This weekend, I grilled Sri Lankan-style shrimp (recipe soon), to toss in a Caesar salad, or with quinoa and tangerine dressing, or just nibble straight up when I want a bite. Better I reach for one of those, instead of a scone. I made two batches of soup on Sunday (chicken and tortellini for the kids, Vietnamese chicken soup for me and Kev — same base, divide into two pots, season and add veggies, etc. appropriately), and Kevin grilled some chicken breast for Kavi’s Caesar salads. Of course, I’m traveling at least one weekend out of four, and I’m not always as organized or energetic as I was this weekend. But still, something to aim towards.

Pictured, a batch of mushroom-swiss egg bites, in the new silicone egg cooker — I did these in the Instant Pot, and I have to say, it was easier than doing them in the sous vide, and I’ll probably take this option going forward. I think you could also just do them on the stovetop, with a steamer tray, if you took a little care with temps.

The kids and Kevin don’t like mushrooms, so this batch is just for me, but I think I’ll try cheddar bites next time, and then if they’ll eat that (they do like scrambled eggs, but this form is going to look weird to them), maybe cheddar-broccoli? For me (and maybe Kev), Sri Lankan green-chili & onion bites will be appealing, but it may take a while to get the kids on board with that. I’m not sure they’ll ever greet them with the excitement of a batch of muffins or scones, but I think I can be okay with that.

And it’s not like the easy carbs are going away entirely — I’m still going to bake! But I guess this is a reminder to myself, more than anything else — there are lots of ways to show love with food.

Here, have something delicious and also healthy, because I want to make it easy for you to take better care of yourself. Let’s make sure we have plenty of fruit and veg and lean protein in the shopping cart this week. I love you.

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Sri Lankan-Style Green Chili & Onion Egg Bites

Sri Lankan-style egg bites, done in the sous vide — delicious. it was very satisfying finding a way to make my favorite egg breakfast in egg bite form.  The sweetness of the onion, the flavorful heat of the green chilies, all wrapped in unctuous egg and creamy cheese — perfection!

10 minutes active cooking time, serves 7.

1 T ghee or butter
1 medium onion, chopped fine
1-2 green chilies, chopped fine
8 eggs
3 oz. cream cheese
1 t. salt
1 t black pepper
extra equipment: 7 4 oz. / 125 ml canning jars with 2-part screw on lids

1. Fill sous vide cooker with water and set to 172 F.

2. Sauté onion and green chili in ghee until golden.

3. In a blender, combine eggs, cream cheese, salt, and pepper until smooth.

4. Distribute onion-chili mixture evenly among seven canning jars, and follow with evenly distributed egg mixture.

5. Attach lids and close to fingertip tightness — do not over-tighten.

6. Once closed, submerge jars in water bath and set timer for 1 hr.

Serve warm — I eat them straight from the jar, generally, but you can also slide a butter knife around the jar, invert onto a plate, and broil or sear with a torch for color if you’d like a fancier presentation. They reheat easily in the microwave (no lid!) for about a minute on low heat. Enjoy!

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Bell Pepper and Goat Cheese Egg Bites

I can’t take credit for this recipe — I pretty much followed the instructions on the Anovo website for egg bites, using leeks instead of scallions, because I happened to have them on hand. But I’ll say that it was yum.

Very delicate, roasting the peppers — honestly, I think I’d be fine with using raw peppers in this, for more of a fresh bite. And I’d probably use a little more cheese, a bit more black pepper, for some more oomph. But the general concept, good.

Nice to take fifteen minutes on the weekend to prep, one hour in the sous vide, and then have six warm eggy breakfasts for the week to come, that you can just grab and eat with a spoon, or decant (maybe over some fresh spring greens, lightly dressed) for a slightly fancier presentation.

In general, I’m trying to do more weekend prep to make healthy meals easy during the week. Egg bites, white wine-poached chicken, grilled shrimp, etc. It’s a bit of a process, adapting, but I think it’ll make my life easier during the semester.