Ok this will be a quick one. I wanted to put up part 2 of the food escapade in Singapore but the photos aren’t edited, nothing’s done with it and I’m all of a sudden, too busy. So here is a quick one.

I’ve been loving cooking breakfast like these during the weekends (when I have no classes to teach). It’s cheap and delicious and healthy! (OK maybe you can ignore the Hollandaise sauce when it comes to being healthy, but surely better than nasi lemak or bah kut teh?) So I’ve got this piece of salmon and I thought of poaching it instead of panfried/  grill for a breakfast option.

I found a recipe for poached salmon here and just made it without the rice. Then under it are 2 slices of bread, 2 poached eggs and hollandaise sauce (which I used ghee instead of butter)

Eggs Royale uses smoked salmon to substitute ham in the usual Eggs Benedict. There are so so so many variations that I wouldn’t mind trying them ALL!! Eggs Florentine uses spinach, Irish Benedict replaces ham with corned beef or Irish bacon, but the most common ones here are probably just Eggs Ben and Royale.

And then we have the other main ingredient, Hollandaise sauce, the mother sauce! It is an emulsion of egg yolk and butter, usually seasoned withlemon juice, salt, and a little white pepper or cayenne pepper. Poured over a poached egg, then when the yolk cracks, with the hollandaise sauce, oh dear I can eat this dish anytime anyday.

Eggs Royale with Tea poached Salmon

(serves 2)

Poached salmon

150g-200g pc fillet salmon fish (depending on how much u want to eat anyway)
1 green tea bag
pinch of sea salt
1 tsp pink peppercorns

Hollandaise Sauce

2 egg yolks
70g clarified butter or ghee (I used melted ghee)*
few drops of lemon juice
2-3 tsp water
salt

4 eggs
dash of white vinegar
handful of chopped parsley

 

 Method

1. To poach the salmon, fill a medium saucepan with water, add the tea, pink peppercorns and salt. Let simmer for about 7 minutes, then drain it restoring the liquid in a bowl.

2. Return the liquid in the saucepan, add the salmon fillet and bring to boil. Simmer for about 10 minutes or until the salmon is just cooked through (pinkish inside is good). Take out the fillet and leave to cool. Fork the fillet into bite sized pieces.

3. To make hollandaise sauce, melt butter or ghee in a small microwavable bowl.

4. Bring a small pot of water to boil. Then bring down to simmer. The bowl on top has to be slightly bigger so the base of the bowl doesn’t touch the water. It’s the steam that heats up the bowl.

5. In a bowl, crack in egg yolks and 2 tsp of water. Whisk over double boiler continuously till it resembles a light sabayon, or somewhat thicker and lighter in colour (about 62 C). Remove from heat. Whisk in melted ghee a little at a time and slowly whisk till it combines. You can use a blender if the amount is huge. But otherwise, a whisk will work just fine. There should be no separation of oil or curdling.

6. Lastly, add in lemon juice and salt to taste. Some uses a reduction of vinegar and water or sherry to replace lemon juice.

7. To poach eggs, bring a pot of water to simmering. Add in a dash of white vinegar. Meanwhile, crack eggs in a small bowl.

8. Use a spatula and stir the water in 1 direction so it creates a whirlpool thingy. Lower the heat, pour in egg and count! Well usually it just takes about 1 minute for me. (Pictorial method here )

9. To assemble, lightly toast bread (english muffins are good too, recipe and method here), top with salmon then with poached egg. Drizzle over Hollandaise sauce. Sorry drizzle is not the right word, POUR over Hollandaise sauce and season with salt and pepper if needed. Chopped parsley makes a good flavour.

10. EATTTT !!!!

That’s it. I can live on this everyday.