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Eggs, Savoury, and Cheese
Butter a pie-dish, and put into it some thin slices of cheese and little cayenne. Break six eggs carefully into the dish, being careful not to break the yolks. Strew over them some finely-chopped parsley and about two ounces of grated cheese. Put a few bread-crumbs on top and small pieces of butter. Bake in a quick oven for ten or fifteen minutes. Probable cost, 1s.
A shallow bake of eggs on cheese, of the sort Cassell's grouped with savouries meant to close a dinner. It comes together in minutes, and the only real decision is how firm you want the yolks.
- Quick ovenRead this as roughly 400-450F. At that heat the crumbs brown and the cheese blisters before the whites turn leathery.
- Watch the time, not the clockTen to fifteen minutes at that temperature will set the yolks hard. Six eggs in a buttered dish are usually done at 8-10 minutes, when the whites are opaque and the yolks still wobble; they keep cooking in the hot dish after it leaves the oven.
- Dish sizeUse a shallow gratin or pie dish about 9 inches across, so the eggs sit in a single layer. Crowded into something deeper they steam rather than bake and the whites go watery.
- The cheeseProbably a firm English cheese such as Cheddar or Cheshire, though the recipe does not say. The bottom slices should be thin enough to melt into a bed rather than a rubbery layer, so slice no thicker than a coin.
- Two ounces gratedAbout half a cup loosely packed. The recipe gives no weight for the sliced cheese beneath, so the total is left to the cook.
- CayenneA pinch, not a spoonful. Cayenne turns up constantly in Victorian savoury recipes, and here it is scattered on the buttered dish beneath the cheese.
- YieldSix eggs serve three as a light supper with toast, or six as a savoury course in small portions. The "probable cost, 1s." is one of the price notes Cassell's attached to its recipes.
This belongs to the savoury, the small hot, sharply seasoned dish that came after the sweet at a formal Victorian and Edwardian dinner, and was often described as a British peculiarity. Cheese, anchovy, bone marrow and cayenne did the work, on toast or baked in a dish, and the point was to leave a salty taste in the mouth rather than a sweet one. Dishes of this kind did double duty at breakfast, at luncheon, or as the last course of dinner, depending on the hour and the size of the portion. Baked eggs of this kind are close cousins to the French oeufs sur le plat, though this version buries them in cheese and browned crumbs.