How do you fry an egg?
Chef’s are very special people; somehow they are a cross between an artist, a dictator and a scientist. I have many great friends who are chefs, the only real enemies I have are also chefs and somewhere in between a few chefs have been more than friends! Having said all that I will never be able to say that I can understand chefs completely.
Chefs need special handling, special understanding and a whole lot of space in which to think and create.
If you doubt me at all, suggested reading material would be The Making of a Chef and the The Soul of a Chef, both by Michael Ruhlman.
Present reading material is The Perfectionist by Rudolph Chelminski. The Perfectionist is Bernard Loiseau, those of you who indulge or move in culinary circles will know that Loiseau was the three-star Michelin chef who committed suicide on 24th February 2003. At the time (and even now) the world’s media blamed his suicide on the fact that Loiseau had got wind of the fact that he was going to lose one of his Michelin stars. For a Chef this is tantamount to the death penalty.
To give you some idea of the level of perfectionism that chef’s aspire to, I am going to quote the following passage (verbatim) from The Perfectionist.
Place a lump of fresh butter in a pan or egg dish and let it melt – that is, just enough for it to spread, and never, of course, to crackle or spit; open a very fresh egg on to a small plate or saucer and slide it carefully into the pan; cook it on heat so low that the white barely turns creamy, and the yolk becomes hot but remains liquid; in a separate saucepan melt another lump of fresh butter; remove the egg on to a lightly heated serving plate; salt it and pepper it, then very gently pour this fresh, warm butter over it.
The above was the method of Chef Fernand Point, of La Pyramide; Chef Point was the mentor of one of Loiseau's mentors. However, Loiseau took it a step further:
Loiseau did not allow the egg to touch anything as vulgar as the direct heat of a pan. He cooked his egg, ever so slowly and ever so gently, in a buttered saucer reposing atop a saucepan of boiling water. (In a later refinement, he advised separating the yolk and the white, cooking them separately and reuniting them only at the end of the operation.)
(…)
The celebrated Mme Sainte-Ange,….picks one further nit of refinement: you must salt only the white, not the yolk, lest it leave unsightly spots.
So, there you have it ladies and gentleman...how to fry an egg!
There is one other book about Loiseau which I cannot recommend highly enough, unfortunately it is out of print at present – but if you can get hold of a copy – Burgundy Stars is excellent reading and an interesting account of the battle it takes to get those coveted Michelin stars.
Chefs need special handling, special understanding and a whole lot of space in which to think and create.
If you doubt me at all, suggested reading material would be The Making of a Chef and the The Soul of a Chef, both by Michael Ruhlman.
Present reading material is The Perfectionist by Rudolph Chelminski. The Perfectionist is Bernard Loiseau, those of you who indulge or move in culinary circles will know that Loiseau was the three-star Michelin chef who committed suicide on 24th February 2003. At the time (and even now) the world’s media blamed his suicide on the fact that Loiseau had got wind of the fact that he was going to lose one of his Michelin stars. For a Chef this is tantamount to the death penalty.
To give you some idea of the level of perfectionism that chef’s aspire to, I am going to quote the following passage (verbatim) from The Perfectionist.
Place a lump of fresh butter in a pan or egg dish and let it melt – that is, just enough for it to spread, and never, of course, to crackle or spit; open a very fresh egg on to a small plate or saucer and slide it carefully into the pan; cook it on heat so low that the white barely turns creamy, and the yolk becomes hot but remains liquid; in a separate saucepan melt another lump of fresh butter; remove the egg on to a lightly heated serving plate; salt it and pepper it, then very gently pour this fresh, warm butter over it.
The above was the method of Chef Fernand Point, of La Pyramide; Chef Point was the mentor of one of Loiseau's mentors. However, Loiseau took it a step further:
Loiseau did not allow the egg to touch anything as vulgar as the direct heat of a pan. He cooked his egg, ever so slowly and ever so gently, in a buttered saucer reposing atop a saucepan of boiling water. (In a later refinement, he advised separating the yolk and the white, cooking them separately and reuniting them only at the end of the operation.)
(…)
The celebrated Mme Sainte-Ange,….picks one further nit of refinement: you must salt only the white, not the yolk, lest it leave unsightly spots.
So, there you have it ladies and gentleman...how to fry an egg!
There is one other book about Loiseau which I cannot recommend highly enough, unfortunately it is out of print at present – but if you can get hold of a copy – Burgundy Stars is excellent reading and an interesting account of the battle it takes to get those coveted Michelin stars.
posted by Madame Chiang at 7:04 am
4 Comments:
"Chefs need special handling"
They do indeed!!!!
That was subtle and very informative, given my early years working in the restaurant industries in San Francisco, Hawaii, and lake Tahoe, and watching chefs create wonderful food. And the hardest was always the easiest: fried eggs and steaks.
I don't eat many eggs, and don't really like them very much, but next time I buy a dozen, I'm gonna try the slow cook method with plenty of butter. Sounds delicious.
And there was me thinking that Delia had gone a bit mad instructing how to boil an egg in one of her books!
Perhaps in Michelin-starred restaurants they recommend only spring water collected by vestal virgins by the light of a waning crescent moon in a leap year in October and to cook for exactly 3m 4.168s?
Friskodude...as you say, the simplest things are always the hardest..particularly in the kitchen!
Dusty Admin - Probably not collected by Vestal Virgins (sorry to disappoint!)!!...but on the subject of mineral water selection, care must be taken...not just any old bottle will do...I know of some meals that are matched specifically to mineral water types depending on their mineral content and therefore their taste....and no, not all mineral waters taste the same!
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