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Buttered or Scrambled Eggs
Beat four eggs well; then take three tablespoons of cream or milk, three ounces of butter, salt and pepper and heat all together in a stewpan till quite hot; now add the beaten eggs, stirring constantly. Serve on buttered toast. A little onion juice and one teaspoon of finely chopped parsley add very much to this dish for some tastes. If preferred, the whites and yolks of the eggs may be separately beaten.
A generous, old-style scramble: the fat goes in first and the eggs are cooked in it rather than in a dry pan. A few numbers need translating, and one of them needs restraint.
- The hinge: low heatThe instruction to heat the butter and cream "till quite hot" before the eggs go in will set the outside of the egg instantly and give you curds swimming in weeping liquid. Warm the fat only until it foams gently and never let it brown, then keep the pan over low heat and stir continuously.
- Three ounces of butterThat is six tablespoons for four eggs, which reflects a period taste for very rich, almost sauce-like eggs. Two tablespoons gives a modern result; if you want the old texture, use the full amount but stir hard so it emulsifies rather than separating.
- StewpanA straight-sided pan, usually with a lid, broader than a saucepan; depth varied. A small nonstick or well-seasoned skillet does the same job, and a heavy base matters more than the shape here.
- Cream or milkThree tablespoons is right for four eggs. Heavy cream slows the set and buys you a margin against overcooking; skim milk gives the thinnest result.
- Onion juiceMade by grating an onion and pressing the pulp through a sieve, or squeezing a cut half against a fine grater. A quarter teaspoon is plenty for four eggs.
- When to stopPull the pan off the heat while the eggs still look slightly underdone and glossy. Carryover heat in a hot buttered pan will finish them in the fifteen seconds it takes to reach the toast.
- Beating whites separatelyThe optional method gives a lighter, foamier scramble closer to a soft omelet. Fold the beaten whites into the yolks just before they go in the pan; whipped whites collapse if they stand.
- YieldFour eggs on toast serves two as a breakfast dish, or four if it is one item among several on the table.
The name is the older one: "buttered eggs" was in use in English and Irish cookery well before "scrambled eggs" became the common term, which appears in print around the middle of the nineteenth century. The older name describes the method literally -- eggs stirred into hot butter until they thicken. The Butterick Cook Book came from the dress-pattern company's publishing arm. The optional onion juice and chopped parsley reflect the older savory-herb tradition in egg cookery.