Eggs Benedict

There is a time and a place for almost everything in life. When it comes to Eggs Benedict, however, the time is always, and the place is anywhere - at least if you ask me.

My obsession with Eggs Benedict started on a faith-altering April morning in 2017, when I chose them - by chance more than anything else - from an overwhelmingly vast menu at a brunch place in Budapest. Since then, I have not only made it a point to try them in as many different places as possible, I have also started to play around with making them myself, sometimes staying faithful to the classic, sometimes adding a little twist or unexpected ingredient. What never changes is my choice of eggs: they have to be from a local farm (or my family garden back in Austria, if I’m lucky) and from happy, free-range and organically-fed chickens - no discussion.

Aside from that, I’m keeping it with the foggy history of the dish (nobody seems to be sure if it was the LeGrand Benedict couple at Delmonico’s restaurant or drunk Lemuel Benedict at the Waldorf Hotel who created it first) and don’t take the original components or time of eating too seriously. For, why not have a slightly adjusted version of the brunch classic also for lunch? And why not prepare it in such a way that it could easily be transported to work with you, adding a little New York flair to your lunch break, wherever you may be around the globe?

Right, I can’t think of any reasons either, so here we go:

Eggs Benedict
(makes 2 servings)
2 slices of dark bread
2 tsp mustard
4-6 strips of bacon
2 slices of ham
2 large eggs
Hollandaise sauce
fresh chives
Hollandaise Sauce
75g butter, melted
1 egg yolk
1tsp mustard
squeeze of lemon
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
splash of white wine vinegar

Hollandaise Sauce

Heat your butter until melted but not browned, set aside to cool slightly.

Place your egg yolk, a dollop of mustard, a squeeze of lemon juice, salt and pepper into a bowl and mix together.

Place the bowl on a pot half-filled with steaming water - make sure the water is not too hot or else your egg might scramble.

Start to whisk the egg mixture, letting the steam heat up the bowl - take care to lift the bowl off the pot from time to time, preventing it from getting too hot. After a while, the mixture should start to thicken slightly. Start adding the melted butter to the egg mixture bit by bit while whisking continuously.

When you have obtained a thick and smooth sauce, take it off the heat. You can season it to taste and adjust the consistency by adding white wine vinegar.

Assemble (at home):

Lightly toast your bread and spread a dollop of mustard each.

Place two slices of roasted bacon and one slice of cooked ham on each slice of bread.

Boil two eggs for about 8 minutes or until you have boiled eggs with a slightly soft but not runny yolk. Depending on the size of your eggs the timing might change. Cut them into slices and place on your bread.

Place them in your box and take a separate container with your Hollandaise sauce.

Assemble (at work):

Microwave your Hollandaise sauce in 10 second increments, stirring it in between each round. After about two rounds, it should be back to a nice consistency.

Pour over your sandwich and garnish with a sprinkle of chives.

Enjoy!

Note: If you don’t have a way of reheating your Hollandaise sauce, let it cool down in the fridge until it becomes hard and spread it on your bread like butter. Add the rest of the ingredients on top.