Thursday, January 25, 2007

Baishali's Spicy Egg Bake



The husband-man is a good cook, ummmm... actually a pretty good cook. In fact when we got married he was the better cook of the two. Over the years, fueled by all that competition I honed up my skills and became a decent cook, he on the other hand for lack of competition and reduced kitchen time offered to him, remained at the same level. So though he could have become the Master Chef if he had worked his way up all these years, he is just a very good cook and a very decent helper around the kitchen now. He does get a chance to show his culinary brilliance for Saturday Breakfasts and when we have friends over for dinner. He whips up just one dish, which my friends "oooh" and "aaahhh" over while I sweat and prepare the rest six which they take for granted, that's what friends are for anyway.

I have nothing to complain though because he understands the difference between sauté and fry and cooks up nice meals when given a chance. Whoever said "Bong" guys can't cook, is mostly wrong. It's just that some guys cook and some don't, nothing to do with bengali and non-bengali. But it's a common refrain among bong women that bong men are too pampered and don't know their way around the Kitchen. My Dad is clueless when it comes to cooking and my Ma used to say that "Ghoti" men (i.e bengali folks who are originally from West Bengal) are incompetent cooks while "Bangal" men (i.e. bengali folks whose ancestors trace back to East Bengal) are good at cooking. The husband-man being the quintessential "bangal" has lived up to the name :)



So this Spicy Egg Bake is his recipe which he learned from one of our friends, Baishali. Every time this dish is prepared, he does it, not once have I prepared this, even if friends call up asking for this recipe I put him on line. It's time I thought we put it on paper and you girls (and guys) can go "wow". It’s easy, great to eat and perfect to serve for dinner when you have friends and family over.

Update: Edited to add photos from Dec, 2017. The husband-man no longer makes this. The onus is now on me. But it is  a simple recipe to follow. Updated with some changes and lots of photos.

Read more...





What You Need

Eggs ~ We used 12 eggs. Brown or white doesn't matter though I like brown eggs better

For masala
Onion ~ 1 medium
Cilantro or Corriander Leaves ~ 1/2 a bunch . Choose a fresh green aromatic bunch
Green Chillies ~ 8-10
Ginger ~ 1/2"

For Sauce
Heavy Cream ~ 1/2 pint . This dish is always prepared at our home when guests are over for dinner so always heavy cream has been used. Try to use a lighter cream if you prefer, can't gurantee the taste though
Tomato paste ~ 1/2 of a 6oz can of Hunt's tomato paste
Salt

Oil

How I Did It
Make green masla for stuffing
Finely chop 1/2 onion, 5 green chillies and the 1/2 bunch of corriander .

Make a thick paste of coriander and green chili in a blender with very little splashes of water. You can add a little olive oil to help make the paste.

Prepare the Eggs

Boil and shell eggs

Cut in halves length wise

Take out the egg yolks

Mix the egg yolks with the
green masala(coriander + green chili paste)
finely chopped onion,
and salt.
Mix nicely with your fingers or masher, whatever you are comfortable with, so that it is an uniform paste.





Put back the masala in each egg half in place of the yolk as shown in the above picture. You don't have to over stuff it, some of the masala should remain for latter use

For sauce
Finely chop 1/2 onion, 4 green chillies and the 1/2" of ginger in chopper or blender
Heat Oil in Kadhai/Frying Pan
Add the above onion-chilli-ginger paste and fry till golden. Add the remainder of the yolk & masala mixture (remember the one used for stuffing the eggs).
Add the tomato paste and cook till the oil separates and there is no more raw smell. Add a little sugar.
Add the heavy cream and mix thoroughly. At this point sauce will be pinkish in colour
Bring it to a boil
Add salt and let it simmer at medium heat until the mixture reduces to consistency of a thick sauce

To Bake

Take a baking dish.

Put 2 tbsp of sauce at the bottom

Put the eggs the yolk side up in a layer. A single layer is preferable. You can do 2 layers if required




Pour the sauce over the eggs in the baking dish, making sure that sauce coats all the eggs well. The sauce would be thick so they wouldn't be dunked in the sauce but uniformly coated with it

Heat Oven to 350F and bake for half an hour or till the top surface of the eggs are carmelized to a nice brown colour





Enjoy the eggs by themselves or with Pulao or Roti. You can be creative about the stuffing and change or experiment with other ingredients too.

Why Corriander Is Good For You

Though Coriander is believed to have originated in the Mediterranean area, and in southwest Europe, both the leaves and seeds of this plant are widely used in Indian cuisine
Coriander has been used as a folk medicine for the relief of anxiety and insomnia in Iranian folk medicine. Experiments in mice support its use as an anxiolytic.
Coriander essential oil showed a delay in E. Coli growth, suggesting possible agricultural anti-bacterial applications.
Coriander seeds have also been used to prepare a traditional diuretic in India . The diuretic is prepared by boiling equal amounts of coriander seeds and cumin seeds. The extract is then cooled and consumed as a diuretic . Source is from wiki
I am sending this dish over this weeks WHB started by lovely Kalyn of Kalyn's Kitchen and this week hosted by Ed of Tomato
Trivia: There is a website I Hate Cilantro which has more than 1200 members all of whom say No to Cilantro

44 comments:

  1. Oh my goodness, does that look fabulous!! Bookmarked to try on the weekend, Sandeepa, thanks to you both :)

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  2. My My!!!! I am not much of an egg eater, but this surely prompts me to pick up one piece from the plate :)

    And can't help going green over your husbands culinary skills!!!!!!

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  3. Wow, you're so lucky to have a husband who can cook! :) Mine has a limited repertoire of recipes and makes a big mess of the kitchen, so he's no longer welcome to cook, heh heh! But I'm a huge egg eater, so this one's definitely turning up on my table some day!

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  4. SLLLLLUUUUUUUUUUURRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPPPP!

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  5. Sandeepa, I am big fan of any egg dish, this looks delicious. You never mentioned if D was a Bengal or Bangal but anyways he sure does cook.
    PS: I saw your dish on Indian American and a some interesting tid bits about you.

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  6. That looks delicious Sandeepa. Your husband is quite a good cook.. Will try this recipe and let you know how it turned out. Thanks to you and ur hubby.

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  7. What a lucky girl to have cooking expert for a husband!Mine does coffee in the mornings for himself and that where it ends!:D
    Egg Bake looks delicious!Mmmm..!!

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  8. Linda
    Do let me know if you try it

    Coffee
    Do you guys eat egg at all ? Nothing to go green, men come in all kind of packages, and we girls always go green over the other package :)

    Shilpa
    Yeah he is kinda neat so I do let him cook some times :)

    Sra
    :)

    Indo
    It is not Bengal & Bangal
    Actually before our independence Bengal was a big state and then it was partitioned into East & West. Many people from East Bengal immigrated to the West bengal at that time. It's been years but still people with traces of East bengal are known as "Bangal" and people originally from West bengal as "Ghoti" , these words have become a part of bengali culture and cooking now
    BTW where did you get the mag ? have been meaning to ask M, haven't read the article myself :)

    Pavani & Asha
    Thanks but there is a downside of this too. I cannot be sloppy around the kitchen :(

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  9. Egg bake looks yummy...Sandeepa.

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  10. I loved reading that post!! I love eggs and that looks fabulous--and how nice that your husband cooks such a yummy dish. My husband used to try his hand at cooking, but he stopped and has forgotten everything he knew about cooking!

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  11. Sandeepa I am not sure how we got into their mailing list but the magaizine has been arriving in the mail the past few months. can you leave a comment with your email.

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  12. wow sandeepa
    eggs are looking delicious...!!!!
    can't resist to make..will try definitely..thanks for sharing..

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  13. That is a wonderful recipe Sandeepa! How did you came up with this Idea of boiling the eggs and than baking them with stuffing??? This is a very creative recipe and a beautiful presentation too!
    Happy Republic day!

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  14. Hi Sandeepa

    I am sure M would love this curry. I am surely going to try it ASAP.

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  15. What a fool you are? You got a husband with cooking skills and instead of encouraging him, you took over the kitchen??? What??? :)

    Mine the first day after marriage declared he forgot cooking completely!

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  16. Sandeepa, This looks lovely! The list of recipes I have bookmarked to try from your blog gets longer and longer - I am falling behind on trying them out :-(

    Not all Bangal men cook well - My husband is a Bangal whose idea of cooking is making coffee and heating a ready dinner. Perhaps he's just really smart and figured out the only way to avoid any kitchen duties it to make a couple of awful dishes early on in the marriage :-)

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  17. Wow! That looks absolutely delicious, Sandeepa! So nice that your husband cooks -mine claims he likes to cook but he hasn't done that in years now! :)
    Do let your husband know that there are more oohs and aaahs that are headed his way! :)
    Lovely pix, too, S.

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  18. Sri,
    Thanks

    Sher
    maybe you should give him some incentive to go back :)

    Swapna
    Thanks

    nidhi
    Not my idea really. We first had it at a friend's place, don't know the original creator

    LakshmiK
    Yeah do try it

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  19. Inji
    I could let him cook if he agreed to be "the cook" and let me order :) while he did the cooking.
    But that was not to be of course, he wanted to be the Master Chef and call his own shots
    Now The "Bharatiya nari" that I am, how could I allow "mere kitchen mein uski raaj", so I had to take over

    Sj
    I always though Bangal men are good cooks, at least if they didn't cook they helped around. So this is not an universal truth ?

    Vani
    The "oohs" and "aahs" are the incentives :)

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  20. I love your egg bake much more better than the regular devil eggs in here! About cilantro, I just don't get why people kick up such a big fuss telling other how they hate it... I love it though! The more the merrier :D

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  21. Wow Sandeepa U are so lucky to get a husband who cooks so wonderfully. egg bake looks like a long process but the end result is sure worth . they look so inviting..

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  22. Generalization of Bangals and Ghotis is not correct as I have seen either ways.

    The spicy egg bake looks awesome... I wish I could try it, except have started having a dislike for eggs.

    Been travelling a little and the last post was actually on a flight ...

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  23. Sandeepa, i don't know some how i missed this post in bet.Thanks god i found it..it looks..delicious..gonna try it this weekend..as my son loves eggs.Will post the pic. soon..Thanks for sharing.

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  24. This fabulous recipe is bookmarked to be tried. Must thank your hubby..:)

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  25. This 'Ghoti' has to admit the eggs look delicious! Have to try this out soon. I must remember to ask my wife, who isn't Bengali, about her opinion on 'pampered and lazy' Bong men!

    Thanks also for the posts on Pati Shapta & Saraswati Pujo; brings back fond memories from my childhood days.

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  26. Hi Sandeepa,
    Husbands!....well, they do come up with some really creative stuff when we *let* them, don't they?
    Maybe I should start a "hubby in the kitchen event" too...haha.
    K does cook for all of us once in a while..and he does a great job,and you know what,I am going to be posting a recipe that he made for us yesterday.
    Those eggs look good...never seen this recipe before with a green masala stuffing! 3 cheers to your hubby.

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  27. Gattina,
    Thanks yeah cilantro is a big part of my cooking too

    Prema
    It's not really a long process, and you can do the stuffing the night before and the baking on the day you serve

    Kausum
    Sniff, sniff, smell a "ghoti" there. Yeah I know these "ghoti" "bangal" stuff has become like bengali folklore now

    Maheshwari
    Thanks for trying this

    Sailaja
    let me know how it comes

    Santanu
    Love to hear your wife's opinion. And I never said "pampered, lazy, bong men" Just said that's what bong women think "bong men are pampered" :) You should give me credit for taking bong men's side in my post :)

    Trs
    Looking forward to K's post, in fact the Veg. Noodle he made the other day was great too

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  28. sandeepa, your hubby is a great cook..Never has an egg dish been so yummmmmmmmm!! Thanks for sharing this nutritious egglicious dish:))

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  29. Hi Sandeepa,
    Plan to make this this weekend, but had a question. The last photo (the eggs without any jhol) is that after baking just the eggs, without any gravy?
    Asking as I am thinking of trying it without any gravy.

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  30. Hey SJ
    Saw your question on the Egg Bake

    Hope the following helps

    1. Make the gravy thick enough, the proportions are as given in the blog but thicken the gravy

    2. When you bake, the gravy will almost dry up, there will be no jhol as such, it will be moist but no jhol. Since the gravy is thick it will brown and make the eggs moist but there will be little or no gravy (almost jhol thakbe na)

    Let me know how it turns out :)

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  31. Hi Sandeepa,

    I found your blog while searching for Bengali recipes on Google. First let me thank you for the innovative and delicious recipes that you have posted here. I am a Bengali Mom living in Chicago and in IT like you and I love to try new recipes. Unfortunately, I don't have your talent for innovating new recipes :-( But I tried your Spicy Egg Bake and Ginger Chicken for a dinner party last weekend; and let me say it was a BIG hit among everybody. All the guests praised my cooking skills and needless to say, I was very proud :-)I didn't take credit for the recipes though and told them your about Blogs and how good a cook you are.

    Thanks again and happy cooking!

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  32. Hi anon
    Thanks so much. Would love to know your name though. Next time you drop by please give your name

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  33. Hey,
    This dish looks delicious. I am an egg lover and will definetly try this. Thank you.

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  34. HI Sandeepa,
    Really unique recipe. I tried it yesterday. But instead of adding heavy cream, I used low fat yogurt. Tastes really good. Thanks for sharing it.
    Rekha.

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  35. Hi!
    I have been reading yr blog often from last month have tired lots of yr recipes, they all turned pretty good.
    And today i tired the baked egg... it was yummy... since i didnt have cilantro, i added green chatni which i had at home.. and it turned out quiet tasty..
    thanks a lot!!
    Cheers.
    J

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  36. Really.. it is very nice.. thanks sandeep.. I will make this coming weekend...
    -jitu from singapore

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  37. Hi! Stumbled on this while generally looking for egg recipes and it sounds absolutely delicious and I can't wait to try it. I am not able to view any of the photos though, not sure if its just a problem on my end or if you could fix it? Thanks a ton!

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  38. This is a great idea. I've not come across a bake. We make deem-er dalna at home and when the eggs have been hard boiled we make length-wise slits with a sharp knife around the egg, rub some turmeric, salt and red chilli powder onto them, and fry in butter. The outer skin goes crispy and tastes incredible. I'll try your bake with the spicy fried hard boiled eggs.
    Thanks for a great post!

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  39. I love this dish. Picture looks great! Need to try soon
    Susmita Das Cincinnati, Ohio

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  40. Hi Sandeepa,
    The egg recipe looks very inviting.Will surely try this weekend and will let u know as to how it turned out. I have just one doubt. Can I use home made tomato puree instead of the Hunt's tomato paste that u have used?
    Hmm coming to the topic of husbands:Mine is a ghoti like me..and he learnt cooking even when I never knew how to prepare Maggi..I still remember he had prepared Malpoa when we were engineering grads..but after we tied the knot the only time he steps into the kitchen is when I am ill. As my thamma(granny) points out: "Ghora dekhe khoda hoye geche"(Literally translates to: After seeing a horse he has become a cripple). I must say u r lucky to have a hubby who is so willing to help u in the kitchen. Yes grass is always greener on the other side!!

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  41. Debjani

    You can use tomato puree but in that case you need to cook it longer till the raw smell is gone and the sauce is thickened enough.

    I am sure he does that because he loves your food :-) Mine had serious concerns with my cooking after we got married ;-), now he rarely ventures into the kitchen.

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  42. hi.. loved th recipe of the baked egg dish... looks so yummy !!!
    have a small question: can i substitute cream with yogurt??

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  43. i was looking for some egg dish...this looks awsome..i will definitely try.

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  44. This weekend my husband and I tried this dish and it turned out great! Thanks for this recipe :)
    I stumbled upon your blog when I was looking for a recipe for aloo posto. I'm a Kannadiga who is recently married to a Bengali guy :)I've been extensively reading your blog for the bengali recipes :)

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