SK week 2 | The Crispy Egg

Dan has been in Florida all week. The other morning he sent me this.

So obviously, I sent him this and said "You're mean!"

Anyway, when Dan is gone I don't cook much in the way of "normal" meals. There's a lot of "Hey, maybe there are some leftovers in the fridge!" and "Hey, let's grab Chipotle!" and "Hey, how about eggs and toast!"

Which leads me to this weeks Smitten Kitchen recipe: The Crispy Egg. I've seen her post it numerous times and just haven't tried it until this week. When I make eggs for all of us, it's generally scrambled or hard-boiled, as those are the most crowd-pleasing around here. But if I'm making an egg for myself, I prefer a nice over-easy with a somewhat runny yolk. So I was excited to try a different approach to the fried egg. :)

(Here's Smitten Kitchen's post for it)

Obviously no out-of-the-ordinary ingredients this week, but I did buy that spiffy little fish spatula for it! It's a long overdue purchase, as my over-easy egg frying usually leaves me with broken yolks, bad words, and a sad lunch. There are a bunch on Amazon--mine was about $6.

So you need a pan--either cast iron or stainless steel (I don't know why not non-stick--I'm just following Deb on this one), a fancy spatula, an egg, and oil or cooking fat of your choice.

Heat your pan of choice on high for one full minute. Then add a "glug" (I don't have the specific measurement for glug, but follow your heart) of your oil and let THAT heat for another 30 seconds. I actually did time these two pre-heats because I wanted to do this right. :)

Super hot oil:

Now drop your egg in and GET THE HECK AWAY FROM YOUR PAN. I cracked it into a bowl first so I didn't have to fumble with egg shells while simultaneously being burned with splattering oil.

But for real, it will sound mad. Just stand back and let it be.

"This is your brain on drugs." (Where my 90s kids at?)

So the egg whites are going to be super bubbly and mine eventually curled over my yolk.

I also spooned some of the hot oil over the top to finish cooking the egg white. It was really taking everything in me not to flip it, so this helped me.

I had it on toast, because I like toast with my runny egg yolk. However, this yolk wasn't runny at all, which was a bummer. I should have either skipped the spoon-basting or started it earlier, as I think that was the culprit.

Final verdict: Eh. I was underwhelmed. It was my own fault for overcooking it. The crispiness was nice, but honestly not enough for me to want to try again. And for sure not enough to make it worth scrubbing my stainless steel pan for as long as I had to. ;)

BUT I do have a fancy new egg flipper for when I next make a perfectly runny over-easy egg! So all is not lost. :)