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Shirred Eggs
Lightly butter six shirred-egg dishes with one tablespoon butter; carefully crack two fresh eggs into each dish. Season with a light teaspoon salt and three saltspoons white pepper, equally divided; then place the dishes in a moderate oven for five minutes. Remove from the oven and serve.
A six-portion breakfast dish from an era when every household had a stack of small ovenproof dishes. Almost nothing here needs changing except the timing, which will not set the whites.
- SaltspoonsA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon, so three of them come to about three-quarters of a teaspoon of white pepper across all six dishes. That is a light dusting each, which is the intent.
- Moderate oven350F (175C). Put the empty buttered dishes in for a minute or two first so the whites begin to set on contact rather than spreading thin.
- The dishesShirred-egg dishes are shallow round ceramic or glass gratin dishes about four to five inches across, with low sides. Ramekins work, though the deeper shape steams the eggs rather than baking them; a small cast-iron skillet also serves.
- Five minutes is not enoughAt 350F, two eggs in a cold dish will still have transparent, liquid whites after five minutes. Reckon on 10 to 14 minutes, and judge by the white: it should be uniformly opaque and just firm at the edge, with the yolk still soft.
- Yolk donenessBaked eggs carry over noticeably once out of the oven, so pull them while the yolks still tremble. Whites that look set through the middle usually mean overdone yolks by the time the dish reaches the table.
- ButterOne tablespoon across six dishes is thin. Use a teaspoon of soft butter per dish, worked up the sides, or the whites will weld to the ceramic.
- YieldSix servings of two eggs each. The dishes are meant to go to the table as they are, on a plate or folded napkin, since they hold heat and will keep cooking.
"Shirred" is an old American kitchen word, sometimes linked to the shirring of cloth, though the origin is not settled; by the nineteenth century it was being applied to eggs broken into a shallow buttered dish and set in the oven. The French oeufs sur le plat is a close relative, cooked in the dish it is served from. The recipe's brevity is characteristic of the genre: the author assumes the reader already knows what a set white looks like and needs only the proportions.