My Favourite Ingredient

There are many ingredients that I love to cook and eat with... but above all of the exotic and sometimes painfully expensive ingredients that I can think of, the humble egg takes the numero uno spot in every single way - flavour, texture, versatility and visual appeal. To me... a perfectly cooked egg can transform any dish from pedestrian to something completely memorable and extraordinary.

And so, waking up unusually early on a lazy Sunday morning (I blame this crazy Perth heat) gave me the perfect opportunity to experiment with cooking my favourite ingredient with a new technique - slow poached in its shell.

Readers who remember my post from late last year on Cumulus Inc (that fantastic breakfast spot in Melbourne) will remember how I fell in love with the 65/65 egg dish. Basically an egg poached in its shell at 65 degrees celcius for 65 minutes - I was swooning over the creamy texture of the not quite set egg yolk with the barely set egg white. And so, figuring I had time to dedicate to giving the mighty egg what it deserves, I set out to recreate this dish.

Now a word of warning - this did take a little bit of love and care during the cooking process (particularly if like me, you don't have the luxury of a induction hob which helps with maintaining a constant temperature)... but I firmly believe that food cooked with love is food worth cooking. Plus - the reward makes it all worthwhile.

I simply used a candy thermoeter and immersed a super fresh free range (please) egg in cold water which I brought to a warm bath of 65 degrees celcius (never allow the water to come to the boil or the dish is ruined).

Slow is the name of the game here - but 65 minutes on, crack your egg in a dish and you'll marvel at how beautifully shaped and intensely flavoured this super ingredient truly is. All that's left to do is to serve with fresh toast soldiers and a glass of orange juice for breakfast heaven... eggs-actly the way it should be.