the kickshaw kitchen: Baked Eggs with Fresh Herbs and Cheese

Butter. Eggs. Cheese. Back in the days when we were still kids, we always wanted our eggs, sunny side-up or scrambled, cooked in butter and loads of cheese. We usually have it for our afternoon snacks, but there were times when we would want it to be part of all our meals for the whole day on very rare instances. As years have gone by, I've outgrown having my butter-eggs-cheese fix the way we knew how it was done probably for the reason that my palate grew to like more mature and more cultured dishes and veer away from the usual fried or scrambled eggs. Since then, the urge has never resurrected while our eldest brother still raves for sunny side-ups with lots of butter and melted cheese to this day with the addition of finely chopped garlic that adds more class to the usual fried egg.

Then I came across this book by Samantha Sotto in August of 2011. Since this is not a blog about book reviews, I'm stopping myself from writing down how the story went. Let's just say it's somewhat Time Traveler's Wife but with more hope. Apart from how Shelley and Max have met through a European group tour and how their love story have gone in the book, Max's baked eggs and cheese played a major role how the mystery of immortality was laid down in the story. Check out the video teaser, too. Bottomline is that the book left me wanting to try Max's baked eggs and cheese just the way how I imagined it.

Samantha recommended three recipes of baked eggs posted here which I only found out after making my own easy-peasy recipe I'm about to share below. I'll try hers someday - I've read somewhere that she recommends the one with avocado and feta as it is divine.

The first time I've done my recipe was in September 2011, a month after the book was released (and right after I finished reading my copy). I've done this a couple of times already, playing around with available herbs, and it's guaranteed to be a no-fail recipe - just don't overbake the eggs so better acquaint yourself with your oven!

Baked Eggs with Fresh Herbs and Cheese
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons all purpose cream
2-3 eggs
1 tomato, diced
1-2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
Any fresh herbs (basil, parsley, tarragon and/or thyme), chopped
salt and ground pepper
1/4 cup grated cheese (any variation will do - for this recipe, I made use of my leftover mozzarella cheese and a few pinch of cream cheese)

1. Preheat oven at 150C.
2. Prepare all your ingredients so that everything is within reach. In a big ramekin (if you don't have one, any oven-safe bowl will do as long as it will fit your oven), mix in the butter and the cream together.

3. Place the ramekin in the oven and bake for 5 minutes until it's a bit bubbly. While the butter and cream mixture is baking, mix the diced tomato, chopped herbs* (basil and parsley for this recipe), chopped garlic, then season with salt and pepper. If you're using salted butter, there's no need to put too much salt.
*The amount of herbs you will put will depend as to your desire. Not everyone likes herbs the same way as the others do. Feel free to adjust the amount you'll be putting in. :)

4. Once the butter and cream mixture is done baking, take it out from the oven then put the eggs in the hot ramekin. Keep the oven hot and running as it won't take you long to complete the dish at this point.

5. Sprinkle with the tomato, herbs and garlic mix over the eggs.

6. Then finish off by topping the grated cheese. For this recipe, I've put tiny pinches of cream cheese after the tomato, herbs and garlic mix then covered the whole ramekin with grated mozzarella.

7. Put the ramekin back in the oven again to continue baking the eggs for another 7-12 minutes depending as to how runny you want your baked eggs would be. It's okay if the eggs look not quite done yet after 7-12 minutes as the eggs will still continue to bake after you take out the ramekin as long as it's still hot. Don't go over 12 minutes as otherwise you will have an open version of hard boiled eggs which we are not aiming for in this recipe.