Now this is an incredibly delicious and surprising way to cook an egg. Great for vegetarians as well as people who just love food.
serves 4
- 10 eggs
- 4 T or so of coconut oil or olive oil
- 1/2 t turmeric
- dash of chili powder (more if you like it spicy)
- 2 medium onions
- 2 inches ginger
- 10 toes garlic
- 6-8 medium tomatoes
- 1 T tamarind paste
- 2 t honey
- 1/2 c hot water
- Himalayan or sea salt
Method:
Prepare your eggs: First hard boil your eggs by adding them into a pot with cold water and slowly bring to a light boil, boil for about 8-10 minutes. Remove from heat, immediately dump out the boiling water and cool with cold water. This will make the eggs easier to peel. Cut the eggs in half and use the coconut oil to sear the eggs, first with the yolk side down and then on the other side. This will help to keep the eggs together when adding in the sauce.
To prepare the tomato sauce: In the meantime, slice your onions, cut and pound your ginger and garlic to a paste. Cut your tomatoes into quarters, and remove the seeds, slice the tomato wedges thinly–about the same size as your onions. Put your tamarind paste into a bowl, add the hot water to the tamarind and dissolve it, mush it up and remove any seeds.
Heat about 1 T of oil, add the turmeric and chili powder, add your sliced onions, garlic and ginger and saute until cooked (about 5 minutes). Add in your tomatoes and continue to cook. You can add in small amounts of water at any time to help preventing the onions and tomatoes from burning or sticking to the bottom of the pan. When the tomatoes are nicely cooked add in your tamarind slurry.
The tomatoes and tamarind will make the sauce quite sour, so if it helps to cut the sour with a touch of sweetness. Add in a bit of honey if you find the sauce too sour. Add in your salt* and pepper.
Gently add your fried eggs to the tomato sauce and allow to simmer for about ten minutes to get the flavor infused through the eggs.
This dish is usually served with rice and balachaung. Since we are currently on the GAPS diet, we like to eat it with spaghetti squash and broccoli salad. This is really a surprisingly tasty and exotic meal.
*If you aren’t vegetarian you may want to use fish sauce instead of salt as fermented products are very good for cutting sour foods.
**Rachel Ray peeled the shells, not hell 😉 My laptop’s touch pad screwed up!
We Burmese use fish sauce and masalar (Indian gram masalar/curry powder). My aunt added one palm sugar (small piece) into the dish and it was great. I’ve never heard of using honey though. We love to have cube potatoes in the dish. Never boring dish and cheap too.
My Thai and Malay neighbors have similar recipes:
Thai Recipe: Son-In-Law Eggs
http://rasamalaysia.com/thai-recipe-son-in-law-eggs/
Malaysian Sweet and Sour Eggs Recipe (Eggs Masak Branda/Belanda)
http://rasamalaysia.com/recipe-malaysian-sweet-and-sour-eggs/
This is how Rachel Ray (30 Minutes Meals from Food Network) peeled hells from hard boiled eggs:
Remove hot water and close the lid tight. Shake well the pot while tightening the lid. Pour cold water into the pot and peel off the shells. So easy!
Wow thanks Naomi, great info. The main reason I used honey and no potatoes is because we are on the GAPS diet so we aren’t able to use sugar and carbs right now. Great to do it the traditional way as well :). So true that it is never boring and cheap!
I do something similar this time of year, minus the tamarind plus curry and yogurt: eggs korma. I’ll have to try this version.
That sounds tasty. I am definitely gonna have to try that sometime.
Wow, this looks so delicious — I’m definitely going to have to try it!
Oh, I am SO keeping this recipe. Everything about it screams, “eat me!!”