Heat some butter in a pan; then break in as many eggs as needed and fry them; add some sliced onions. Remove the eggs to a platter; arrange the onions on the eggs; sprinkle with salt and red pepper and pour over some lemon-juice. Serve as hot as possible on toast.
A one-pan breakfast dish with almost no measurements, which leaves the cook two decisions the original glosses over: how the onions get cooked, and how far to take the eggs.
- Cook the onions firstAs written the sliced onions go into the pan alongside eggs that need two or three minutes at most, so they would still be raw and sharp. Soften them in the butter over medium-low heat for eight to ten minutes until limp and lightly coloured, lift them out, then fry the eggs in the same pan.
- "Red pepper"In books of this period red pepper means cayenne, not paprika and not a fresh sweet pepper. A pinch is enough; it is there to cut the butter and the lemon.
- Butter quantity"Some butter" for four eggs means roughly two tablespoons, plus a little more if the onions drink it. Enough to film the pan generously but not to deep-fry.
- EggsFried until the whites are set and the yolks still soft. If the yolks are left runny the dish is essentially eggs with a warm dressing, so cook them to your household's comfort with soft yolks.
- The lemon juiceThe original pours it over the assembled platter, not into the pan, so add it off the heat at the end.
- ToastUse a sturdy slice that will hold butter and lemon juice without collapsing. Toast it while the onions cook and warm the platter, since the recipe asks for the dish to be served on toast and as hot as possible.
- YieldTwo eggs per person and one medium onion for every two or three servings. As written it scales to whatever the pan will hold in a single layer.
The book belongs to a genre popular either side of 1900: a dish a day, each pinned to a nation, giving the home cook the flavour of foreign travel without leaving the kitchen. The national labels in these collections are loose, and "Dutch" here rests on little more than butter, onions and eggs, a trio common to much of northern Europe. The finish is perhaps the most telling part: lemon juice and cayenne over fried eggs sit comfortably with a period taste for sharpening rich breakfast food with acid and a bite of pepper, the same instinct that put lemon beside fried fish and cayenne in devilled dishes. Serving on toast suggests a breakfast or supper dish rather than a formal course.