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Eggs in Bacon Rings
6 long slices bacon 6 eggs salt and pepper garnish of parsley Curl slices of bacon around the inside of muffin cups or small ramekins. Break an egg inside each bacon ring, season with salt and pepper and bake until set, but not hard. Remove carefully from dish so that egg will remain fastened to bacon. Arrange on platter; garnish with parsley. Serves six.
A straightforward baked egg that depends almost entirely on how far the bacon has cooked before the egg goes in. The original omits an oven temperature, which is the one number worth fixing.
- Oven temperatureNo setting is given. Baked eggs of this type want a moderate oven, 350F, for 12 to 18 minutes; hotter than that and the whites toughen at the edges before the yolks warm through.
- Par-cook the baconThis is the hinge. Much supermarket bacon today is thin and brine-pumped, and in the time the eggs need it may render out and go limp rather than set into a ring. Lay the slices in a dry pan for two or three minutes a side until they are pliable but beginning to firm, then curl them while warm.
- Grease the cupsThe instruction to remove the egg so it stays fastened to the bacon only works if nothing has stuck. Butter or oil the muffin cups well, including the base, and run a thin knife around the rim before lifting.
- "Long slices"A slice needs to reach right round the inside of the cup with a slight overlap. A standard 12-cup muffin tin takes roughly a 7 to 8 inch slice; ramekins of 4 oz capacity need a longer one, or two shorter pieces overlapped.
- "Set, but not hard"The white should be opaque throughout with the yolk still soft. Eggs continue cooking in the hot tin, so pull them when the yolk still trembles under a light touch. Anyone cooking for a person who should not eat a soft yolk should bake until the yolk is firm to the centre.
- Yield and servingSix, at one egg each, which reads as a single component rather than a full plate. Buttered toast and stewed or fresh fruit round it out; serve them straight from the oven.
Baking eggs in individual moulds was already well established as oeufs en cocotte; substituting a bacon collar for the buttered ramekin is a homelier American turn on it.