It's Breakfast Thyme

Some people adore Saturday/Sunday breakfasts; I am not one of those people. On weekends I prefer to sleep in late, 10- 11am late. (Friday and Saturday are generally late-nighters.) If I have to wake up early, I am useless in the kitchen. My imagination is sluggish around that time so I reach for simple foods, if anything at all. Skipping breakfast is a terrible thing, I know, roll your eyes all you want, I happen to have different priorities than others. If at best, I serve a mean bowl of milk and cereal and for the lucky ones an omelet, toast and coffee. I am much better at creating dishes for lunch and dinner, probably because I have creativity, variety, and versatility on my side.

Saturday was a hectic day. Other culinary students and I volunteered for a pig roast at Makers Mark that day. We met in downtown for American Culinary Federation meeting at 8am (!), drove 4 hours (really it’s supposed to take us 2 1/2 hours but our bus driver got lost) and prepped food for the pig roast for 400+ attendees. We all had a fabulous time, obviously since food and whiskey were involved. We arrived home much later than expected, 3am (!)



The next morning I woke up to a hungry husband and an upset stomach of my own. I remembered one of Ina’s herbed baked eggs recipe. At the time of watching the show I thought if making breakfast food in the morning means breaking couple eggs, adding them to a gratin dish with heated milk or cream and butter with herbs, I can handle it. Thanks Ina for convincing me of the baked eggs' simplicity and lack of need of imagination in the morning. As you can see from the name change, I followed her recipe loosely.

Thyme Baked Eggs

1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme leaves
1 tablespoon freshly grated Parmesan
6 large eggs
3 tablespoons milk, divided
2 tablespoon unsalted butter, divided
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the broiler for few minutes and place the oven rack 6 inches below the heat.

Crack 6 eggs carefully in a 3 separate bowls, 2 per bowl. In another bowl, combine fresh thyme and parmesan and set aside. Using 1/2 tablespoon of butter, grease the three gratin/flan dishes. Divide 1 tablespoon of milk amongst three dishes and add 1/2 tbsp of butter to each dish. Place the three dishes on a baking sheet and under the broiler for couple minutes, until the liquid is bubbly. Remove the baking sheet from the oven, pour (two) cracked eggs to each dish, add equal parts of the thyme and parmesan mixture to all three, sprinkle with salt and freshly cracked pepper. Carefully place the baking sheet under the broiler for 4- 6 minutes, until the egg whites set. Do not over broil otherwise the eggs will burn; eggs continue to cook after removing the dishes from the oven.

The eggs will continue to cook after you take them out of the oven. Allow to set before serving.

Toast with Avocado
2 slices of bread
1 avocado, sliced
sea salt

While the eggs are in the oven, cut avocado lengthwise. Rotate two halves to detach from each other. Remove the seed with a knife. Make slits in each half of the avocado for long slices. Scoop out the flesh with a large spoon.

After the eggs are done, toast wheat bread in the broiler for 30 seconds.

Spread sliced avocado on toasted bread, sprinkle with sea salt and serve with baked eggs.



Changes to the recipe. I used milk to make my baked eggs because I did not have cream on hand. Although it tasted good, I plan to make it again with cream. I am sure with the 40% fat in cream, it’ll give the eggs a rich taste. Let me know if you try it with cream before I do. And next time I’ll also add garlic because everything is much better with it.

Because Thyme was the predominant flavor in this dish, I am submitting my recipe for Thyme Baked Eggs to Weekend Herb Blogging hosted by Jai and Bee over at jugalbandi.

And on a much serious note, Thyme is slowly but surely gaining momentum in my favorite herb list; however Cilantro isn’t going to give in easily so it’ll be a tough fight.