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Fried Poached Eggs
Have three quarts boiling water in a saucepan with a tablespoon salt and a half gill vinegar; when thoroughly boiling carefully crack six fresh eggs into the water and poach for four minutes. Lift up with a skimmer and immediately drop them into cold water; poach six more in same way. Take them up, neatly trim all around, lay on a cloth, carefully turn in melted butter, then in grated Parmesan cheese, and gently drop in boiling fat for one minute; take up, drain on a cloth, sprinkle a half teaspoon salt over them, dress on a dish with folded napkin, decorate with a little parsley greens and serve.
A two-stage egg: poached, chilled, then dropped in hot fat so the outside crisps while the yolk stays soft. Nearly everything depends on the eggs being cold and dry before they meet the fat.
- The hinge: chill and dryThe cold-water bath is not just to stop the cooking; it firms the whites so they can be trimmed and handled. Blot them thoroughly on a towel before the butter and cheese, because a wet poached egg dropped into hot fat will spit violently.
- Half a gill of vinegarA gill is half a cup, so this is about 1/4 cup (2 fl oz) of vinegar in three quarts of water. That is a generous but not unreasonable amount; plain white or cider vinegar both work.
- "Thoroughly boiling"Modern practice poaches at a bare simmer, around 180-190F, with only a few bubbles breaking. A hard boil shreds the whites into rags and makes the neat trimming called for here impossible.
- Four minutesFour minutes at a simmer gives a set white and a yolk that is still liquid at the centre, which is what you want since the egg gets a further minute in fat. If you prefer the yolk barely warm rather than runny, stop at three.
- Frying temperature"Boiling fat" is the period term for deep fat hot enough to fry briskly; no temperature is given, and it is usually read today as somewhere around 375F. One minute is enough to set and colour the cheese coating; longer and the yolk firms up and the Parmesan scorches.
- The coatingButter and grated Parmesan alone, with no crumbs or batter, give a thin patchy crust rather than an even shell. Press the cheese on firmly, and use finely grated hard Parmesan rather than the coarse shredded kind.
- Two batches, by designSix eggs at a time is about the limit for three quarts of water; crowding drops the temperature and the whites tangle. The recipe's instruction to poach in two lots is worth following.
- Yield and servingTwelve eggs serve six as a first course or light lunch. The folded napkin on the dish is period presentation, meant to absorb fat; a warm plate lined with paper does the same job.
Fried poached eggs belong to the elaborate egg cookery of late nineteenth-century restaurant kitchens, where a single ingredient was expected to appear in dozens of guises: oeufs pochés chilled, trimmed, coated and refried is closely related to the crumbed and deep-fried eggs found in French service manuals of the same period. The International Cook Book is generally credited to Alexander Filippini, long associated with Delmonico's in New York, and its contents reflect that background: dishes drawn from professional European practice, written for a household that might still keep a cook.