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July 15, 2006

Spicy salami and poached egg salad

This is another recipe adapted from the British food magazine Olive. I adapted quite a bit, though. The original recipe called for chorizo (which in Britain always means Spanish-style chorizo, which is a hard cured sausage, not Mexican-style chorizo, which is a soft fresh sausage), softboiled eggs, and rocket, as well as for croutons made from ciabatta.

Since it's hard to find Spanish-style chorizo here, I substitued a really nice red pepper fennel salami from the Columbus salami company. It's like one of their regular salamis, only coated on the outside with red pepper and fennel seeds. Yum.

I also swapped poached eggs for the soft-boiled eggs, added tomatoes, and used a salad mix containing mache in place of the rocket. (I like rocket, a.k.a arugula, but I just felt like mixed greens.)

The Ingredients

The Steps

  1. Make the dressing by whisking together the mustard, olive oil, and lemon juice until it's blended.
  2. Put about 1 inch of water in a deep skillet with a lid. Bring to a boil, add the vinegar and some salt, and turn down the heat until the water is just lightly bubbling.
  3. Working one at a time, crack each egg into a shallow bowl and then slide it into the water. Cover the skillet and cook for about 3 minutes. (I like my poached eggs with rather runny yolks, so go about 5 minutes if you want the yolks cooked a bit more.)
  4. While the eggs are cooking, divide your greens and tomatoes between 2 plates. Arrange 4 slices of salami on each plate. Season with a bit of freshly ground pepper.
  5. When the eggs are finished, remove them from the water with a slotted spoon, and place one egg on each salad. Drizzle with the dressing and serve.

For poaching the eggs, I used the technique from Mark Bittman's trusty How to Cook Everything. They were not the prettiest poached eggs I've ever seen - they spread out a bit and were a bit ragged around the edges. But they were perfectly cooked, and I could probably get them a bit prettier with practice. One thing I learned is that it's important to be very gentle when you're slipping the egg into the water - any momentum you impart to that egg is just going to make it spread out more.

This recipe makes a great quick summer supper - it's light, it's easy, and it's different enough to be interesting.

Posted by spaceling at July 15, 2006 09:14 AM

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