Huevos Benedictinos
Do you like Eggs Benedict? If you do, you will love this one; I’ve given the traditional recipe a Mexican twist. Instead of English muffins, I used puff pastry shells. I’ve replaced the bacon and hollandaise sauce with chorizo and creamy salsa.
Ingredients
6 Pepperidge Farm puff pastry shells
Prepared Chorizo
Creamy salsa
Queso Fresco
I will break down the process for each layer. Here’s how:
For the chorizo:
10 oz Mexican chorizo (pork or beef will work)
½ cp onion, finely diced
1 small potato, finely cubed (about ½ cp)
2 tbsp salsa
3 tbsp water
Place a medium-sized skillet over medium high heat, add the chorizo and stir to break it up. Once it begins to render its fat, stir in the onions and cook until they begin to turn translucent. Add the potatoes, salsa and water. Stir it all in, lower the heat to medium low and cover with a lid. Stir it occasionally until the potatoes are fork tender. Set aside, but keep warm.
For the salsa:
This step is optional, if you don’t want to make your own salsa, just add cream to your favorite brand.
8 Roma tomatoes, halved and seeded
2 – 3 serrano peppers, halved
2 cloves garlic, peeled and halved
½ medium onion, quartered
½ cp cilantro, coarsely chopped
½ tsp cumin powder
½ tsp sugar
¾ tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
Add 1 tbsp of the oil to a skillet and place over high heat. When it begins to smoke, add the tomatoes, peppers, garlic, and onion. You want to char and smoke the vegetables, but keep a close watch on them or they’ll burn. Try to get some color on both sides, then remove from the heat and put it all into your blender. Add the rest of the ingredients and puree until all veggies are a mush.
Pour the salsa back into your skillet—you can add about ½ cp water to the blender to remove all the salsa bits—allow the salsa to cook over medium low temperature for about 10 minutes. This will yield about 3 cps of salsa, it will keep in the fridge for about a month.
Measure out ¾ cp of the salsa (you can also use your favorite salsa instead of making it yourself) and add ¼ cp of crema fresca or whipping cream. Stir it in and keep it warm. Set aside.
For the puff pastry:
Preheat oven to 400 and bake shells according to package instructions. Once baked, removed the tops and set aside.
For the poached eggs:
6 eggs, at room temperature
6-7 cps water
1 tsp salt
1 ½ tsp vinegar (I used sherry vinegar)
12” deep saucepan
Slotted spoon
I watched this video and realized I needed not fear the poaching process; this was the best video I watched.
Add the water, salt and vinegar to the pan and bring it to a boil. Once it boils, reduce heat so that the water is at a low simmer. Break the eggs and put each one into a small container, like a cup (one egg per cup).
Now is time to play with your water. Using that slotted spoon, create a swirl in the water. The centrifugal force will help the egg whites swirl onto themselves and make your eggs pretty. Now quickly drop one egg at a time right in the center of the water funnel. The whites will wrap around the yolk and will begin to float as the yolk is done. Here’s the thing. I measured the water temp to about 170-175 and I do like my yolks soft, it took about 5-6 minutes to get them just right. You can cook them longer if you’d rather have a harder yolk. Use the spoon to remove the eggs from the water, let some of that excess water fall off and clean off the eggy tentacles. Set the eggs aside until you’re ready to assemble the dish.
Assembly time!
Take a shell and drop about 2 tbsp of the chorizo, then top the shell with an egg. Top the egg with the creamy salsa, and then sprinkle some of the cheese. Repeat and serve.
And this is what I did with the leftovers!
