Eggs are universal, ubiquitous and unreplaceable.

Eggs can be used for any meal at all—they can be simple and filling, or chichi and spiced . . . and they are one of the foods that is highly personal.

Everyone has his own taste in eggs. Gourmet egg cookery is not easy, therefore, because some like their eggs well-done and others like 'em raw . . .

Every country in the world has its own method of prepar­ing and serving eggs . . . and the quick-cooking prepara­tions are largely in the West. In Eastern countries there are:

EGYPTIAN EGC& (Hamine)

Place eggs in a saucepan of cold water, together with the brown outside skins of several onions. Boil the eggs gently for 2 hours or longer. The onion skins turn both the egg shells and egg whites a delicate brown.

ISTANBUL EGGS

Place eggs in a saucepan, cover with olive oil, Turkish coffee and the brown skins of 3 large onions. Cover the pan and simmer very very gently for a minimum of 12 hours.

CHINESE EGGS

4 eggs 

2 T soy sauce

2 T butter

Boil the eggs for 7 minutes, plunge in cold water, and shell. Melt butter in a saucepan, adding soy sauce and eggs, and cook gently for 5 minutes, basting and turning all the time until the eggs become dark brown.

These are served cold in slices.

ARABIAN EGGS

4 hardboiled eggs-shelled and still warm

4 T butter

½ tsp salt

½ tsp each: paprika, pepper, cinnamon – mixed together

Melt the butter. Prick the egg whites all over with a fork, then add the eggs to the butter and turn over and over, so the butter can soak into the egg. Cook until light brown, place on a warmed serving dish and sprinkle with the salt and spices.

SWISS EGGS

¼ lb imported Gruyere cheese(sliced thin)

4 eggs

¼ cup heavy cream

1 tsp salt

½ tsp pepper

butter

grated cheese

Butter a shallow casserole, line with thin cheese slices. Break the eggs neatly into the casserole, keeping them whole. Add salt and pepper to cream, and pour over the eggs. Top with grated cheese and bake 10 minutes in a moderate oven.

Brown the cheese topping under the broiler for a few minutes, if necessary.

PIPERADE

The Basque version of our Texas or Western omelets.

2 green peppers

2 tomatoes, peeled and quartered

2 T olive oil

1 large chopped yellow onion

1 clove of garlic, pressed

4 eggs

salt and pepper, to taste

Heat the oil, add chopped onion and sliced pepper; saute gently for 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and garlic, salt and pepper, and simmer until reduced to a soft mush, stirring and crushing occasionally with a fork. Add 4 slightly beaten eggs, stir constantly until eggs are set. Serve on buttered toast or thin slices of fried ham—or just plain. It's good any way you serve it.

CREOLE EGCS

A Sunday night supper dish—serve with plain boiled rice. 8 hardboiled eggs, shelled and sliced.

Creole sauce

1 tin condensed cream of celery soup

½ cup milk

¾ cup drained canned tomatoes

1 T minced parsley

1 small onion, sliced thin

½ small green pepper, seeded and chopped

1 clove of garlic

2 T butter

Saute onion, pepper and minced garlic in butter for 5 min­utes, while preparing the Creole sauce. Combine sauce and vegetables. Distribute a few tablespoons of the sauce over the bottom of a buttered casserole, top with some of the hardboiled eggs, and make alternate layers of sauce and egg slices. End with a layer of sauce, sprinkle thickly with bread crumbs and grated Parmesan cheese, and bake 20 minutes in a 375 oven.

SCRAMBLED EGGS A L’INDIENNE

1 large tart eating apple, diced

2 onions, chopped

3 T butter

4 eggs

¼ cup tomato sauce

½ tsp curry powder

Saute onions and apple in butter until soft—about 10 min­utes.

Add curry powder and stir well.

Beat eggs slightly, add the tomato sauce and blend.

Combine with the apple-onion mixture and cook gently over low heat, stirring occasionally until eggs are set and cooked soft.

EGGS BENEDICT and EGGS FLORENTINE

These are the great poached egg dishes, to serve for brunch, Sunday supper or unexpected guests. An egg poacher makes them quick to prepare.

Eggs Benedict

4 English muffins, split, toasted and buttered

8 pieces of ham or Canadian bacon, sautéed in butter

8 poached eggs

8 T Hollandaise sauce(½ cup)

Warm the prepared Hollandaise sauce in a double boiler —to make Eggs Benedict in 30 minutes really will be easier with store-bought sauce!

Saute ham or Canadian bacon gently in 2 tablespoons of butter.

Split, and butter the English muffins; toast in the broiler (an electric broiler is helpful, here). When lightly browned, remove and keep warm.

Poach the eggs—2 eggs for each portion, so even a 4-posi-tion egg poacher will require two operations.

Top each muffin half with a bit of ham or cooked Canadian bacon; place a poached egg atop the meat. Finally, dribble a tablespoon of warm Hollandaise sauce over each egg, and serve.

EGGS FLORENTINE

Anything "Florentine" indicates a base of spinach—and this dish is, quite simply, poached eggs on a bed of cooked spinach, topped by Momay sauce—which is a rich cheese cream sauce.

2 boxes frozen chopped spin- 8 poached eggs ach, cooked and well-drained

1 cup sauce Mornay

2 T grated Parmesan cheese

Steam-cook the chopped spinach while you prepare the sauce (see below).

Heat the broiler oven, and start poaching the eggs.

Drain the spinach and place in a buttered casserole dish; top with the poached eggs. Cover thickly with the warm sauce and sprinkle with cheese.

Broil for a few minutes until the top browns.

MORNAY SAUCE

This is a variation of Bechamel sauce, which is a fussy French version of plain old white sauce. A quick approxima­tion of sauce Mornay—

½ tin condensed mushroom  soup

1 egg yolk

2 T grated Parmesan

1 T butter cream

Combine soup a'nd cream, blend well and strain through a fine sieve to remove mushroom bits. Warm in a double boiler, add slightly beaten egg yolk, and stir well. Add cheese and butter, and stir until completely melted.

SOUFFLES

A souffle is viewed with reverence and awe, because every­one has heard that this is A Production. Myths abound when it comes to souffles; they are supposedly incredibly fussy to prepare . . . difficult to cook . . . and "inclined to wilt de­spondently unless rushed on roller skates from oven to table.

None of these things is true, especially today. Anyone can make a delicious main dish souffle, produce it to the applause of the diners and acquire a fine reputation for gour­met cookery!

Strictly speaking, souffles are out of bounds for a 30-min-ute gourmet chef, because despite the electric egg beater and substituting condensed cream soup for the fussy white sauce base of yesterday's souffle recipes, there is still no way to shorten the baking time. Inevitably this consumes an abso­lute minimum of half an hour in the oven (if you can bear the French type of souffle which is supposed to be moist, even a bit liquid in the center). For a proper souffle (that is, to our personal taste), you must allow 45 minutes.

Still, we include the basic souffle recipe in this book . . . first, because it does not take more than 15 minutes prepara­tion time, even though it needs another 45 minutes in the oven, and secondly, because everyone should be encouraged to try making souffles.

BASIC SOUFFLE RECIPE

1 can condensed cream soup, 1 cup of diced meat,

thin with ½ cup cream chicken, fish, shredded

4 eggs, separated, plus an cheese—or what you wish extra egg white

Heat the oven to 375.

Heat soup in a double boiler top while separating the eggs. (If you are making a cheese souffle, melt the cheese with the soup.)

Beat the egg yolks until thick and lemon-colored.

Beat the egg whites separately until very stiff.

Remove the soup pot and add egg yolks, stirring well. Add meat, fish, vegetables, chicken or anything but cheese at this point. Butter a casserole dish very generously, while the soup mixture cools slightly. Then fold in the stiff egg whites, gently turn the batter into the dish and bake for 30 minutes, or more.

There are things to know about a souffle. First, a souffle is an utterly simple matter of enriching a basic white sauce with beaten egg yolks, then capturing all the air possible through gently folding in stiff-beaten egg whites, which au­tomatically expand in oven heat and carry the rest of the mixture onward and upward.

Secondly, it is true that a souffle does not like to be kept waiting; far better, on souffle night, to collect the diners at table to finish their cocktails and let them wait for the souffle!

Thirdly, a souffle casserole may be set in a pan of warm water in the oven and baked in the same way as a baked custard . . . and if you choose this method, there will be no crust on bottom or sides. Other chefs advise baking a main dish souffle in an unbuttered casserole, so the batter will cling to the sides, form a seal, and force the expanding air even farther upward. A smaller group quietly adds a tablespoon of brandy during the final folding operation, be­cause the spirits not only aid in quick-setting the egg batter but add their own expanding fumes to create the desired puffy brown top.

An extra egg white is additional insurance for a high-minded soufflé.

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