Eggs Benedict

Eggs Benedict
Course Breakfast, brunch
Place of origin New York City, United States
Main ingredients Eggs, English muffin, Canadian bacon, Hollandaise sauce
Variations Multiple

Eggs Benedict, also informally known as Eggs Benny, is a traditional American breakfast or brunch dish that consists of two halves of an English muffin topped with a poached egg, bacon or ham, and hollandaise sauce. The dish was first popularized in New York City. Many variations on the basic recipe are served.

Origin

There are conflicting accounts as to the origin of Eggs Benedict.

Delmonico's in lower Manhattan says on its menu that "Eggs Benedict was first created in our ovens in 1860."[1] One of its former chefs, Charles Ranhofer, also published the recipe for Eggs à la Benedick in 1894.[2]

In an interview recorded in the "Talk of the Town" column of The New Yorker in 1942, the year before his death,[3] Lemuel Benedict, a retired Wall Street stock broker, said that he had wandered into the Waldorf Hotel in 1894 and, hoping to find a cure for his morning hangover, ordered "buttered toast, poached eggs, crisp bacon, and a hooker of hollandaise". Oscar Tschirky, the maître d'hôtel, was so impressed with the dish that he put it on the breakfast and luncheon menus but substituted ham for the bacon and a toasted English muffin for the toast.[4]

Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon in place of Canadian bacon, also known as Eggs Royale

Another, later claim to the creation of Eggs Benedict was circuitously made by Edward P. Montgomery on behalf of Commodore E. C. Benedict. In 1967 Montgomery wrote a letter to then The New York Times food columnist Craig Claiborne which included a recipe he said he had received through his uncle, a friend of the commodore. Commodore Benedict's recipe—by way of Montgomery—varies greatly from Ranhofer's version, particularly in the hollandaise sauce preparation—calling for the addition of a "hot, hard-cooked egg and ham mixture".[5]

Variations

Eggs Benedict with bacon

Several variations of Eggs Benedict exist.

  • Eggs with Peter Beater Juice
  • Eggs Blackstone substitutes streaky bacon for the ham and adds a tomato slice.[6]
  • Eggs Blanchard substitutes Béchamel sauce for Hollandaise.[7]
  • Eggs Florentine substitutes spinach for the ham or adds it underneath.[8] Older versions of eggs Florentine add spinach to poached or shirred eggs.
  • Eggs Chesapeake substitutes a Maryland blue crab cake in place of the ham.[9]
  • Eggs Mornay substitutes Mornay (cheese) sauce for the Hollandaise.[10]
  • Eggs Trivette adds Creole mustard to the Hollandaise and adds a topping of crayfish.[11]
  • Eggs Omar (also known as a steak benedict) substitutes a small steak in place of the ham, and sometimes replaces the hollandaise with béarnaise.
  • Eggs Atlantic, Eggs Hemingway,[12] or Eggs Norvégienne (also known as Eggs Royale and Eggs Montreal in New Zealand) substitutes salmon or smoked salmon for the ham. This is a common variation found in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom, and in Kosher restaurants that cannot serve bacon or any pork products.[13] This is also known as "Eggs Benjamin" in some restaurants in Canada.[14]
  • Huevos Benedictos substitutes sliced avocado and/or Mexican chorizo for the ham, and is topped with both a salsa (such as salsa roja or salsa brava) and hollandaise sauce.[15]
  • Eggs Hussarde substitutes Holland rusks for the English muffin and adds Bordelaise sauce.[16][17]
  • Irish Benedict replaces the ham with corned beef or Irish bacon.[18]
  • Eggs Cochon, a variation from New Orleans restaurants which replaces the ham with pork "debris" (slow roasted pork shredded in its own juices) and the English muffin with a large buttermilk biscuit.[19][20]
  • California Benedict substitutes Avocado Sauce for the Hollandaise; preferably California Hass avocados puréed with lemon juice.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Delmonico's Menu". Delmonico's Restaurant. Retrieved 2016-09-28.
  2. ↑ "The epicurean—A complete treatise of analytical and practical studies on the culinary art, including table and wine service, how to prepare and cook dishes, etc., and a selection of interesting bills of fare of Delmonico's from 1862 to 1894". The Internet Archive. Retrieved 2014-04-17.
  3. ↑ Benedict, Cutts. "Eggs Benedict New York: Feedback". Archived from the original on December 1, 1998. Retrieved February 23, 2007.
  4. ↑ "Talk of the Town". The New Yorker. December 19, 1942. Notes: This hasn't been verified at the source, but is instead taken from the letter to Karpf by Cutts Benedict and the page of J. J. Schnebel.
  5. ↑ Claiborne, Craig (September 9, 1967). "American Classic: Eggs Benedict". The New York Times. Retrieved 2014-04-17.
  6. ↑ Rombauer, Irma S.; Marion Rombauer Becker (1995) [1975]. "Egg Dishes". The Joy of Cooking. Illustrated by Ginnie Hofmann and Ikki Matsumoto (1st Scribner Edition 1995 ed.). New York, NY: Scribner. p. 222. ISBN 0-02-604570-2. Notes: Title of recipe is poached eggs Blackstone. Uses fried slice of flour dipped tomato, minced bacon, poached eggs, and hollandaise. No bread for base.
  7. ↑ Hirtzler, Victor (1988). The 1910 Hotel St. Francis cook book (1st ed.). Sausalito, Calif.: Windgate Press. ISBN 978-0915269068.
  8. ↑ "Rich mix of patrons makes Moto's special". The Atlanta Journal and The Atlanta Constitution. December 18, 1986. pp. A/6. "eggs Florentine ($3.95), eggs poached and topped with Hollandaise sauce, served on spinach and English muffin" Notes: Not directly verified. Viewed through Google News Archive snippet view.
  9. ↑ The Editors of Saveur Magazine (28 October 2014). SAVEUR: The New Classics Cookbook: 1,000 Recipes + Expert Advice, Tips, and. Weldon Owen. p. 461. ISBN 978-1616287351. Retrieved 28 July 2017.
  10. ↑ Claiborne, Craig (May 26, 1960). "Maligned Vegetable Has Loyal Fans". The New York Times. p. 28.
  11. ↑ Thomson, Julie R. "17 Twists On The Classic Eggs Benedict Recipe".
  12. ↑ "Eggs Hemingway (or eggs Atlantic) with smoked salmon | Shelf5". Shelf5. Retrieved September 28, 2016.
  13. ↑ "Eggs Hemingway". Instructables. Retrieved September 28, 2016.
  14. ↑ "Eggs Benjamin breakfast - Picture of Symposium Cafe Restaurant & Lounge, Markham - TripAdvisor". www.tripadvisor.com. Retrieved September 28, 2016.
  15. ↑ "Huevos Benedictos". Instructables.
  16. ↑ DeMers, John (1998). Food of New Orleans: Authentic Recipes from the Big Easy. Food photography by John Hay (1st ed.). Boston: Periplus Editions. p. 44. ISBN 962-593-227-5.
  17. ↑ "Recipes – Eggs Hussarde". Brennan's Restaurant. Archived from the original on February 6, 2006. Retrieved September 28, 2016. Notes: Located in New Orleans, Louisiana.
  18. ↑ Townsend, Elisabeth (July 24, 2005). "Dining Out". The Boston Globe. "Irish Benedict ($7.50): two poached Eggs and corned beef hash on an English muffin covered with hollandaise sauce" Notes: Not directly verified. Viewed through Google News Archive snippet view.
  19. ↑ "Eggs Cochon du Lait" Eat Your World
  20. ↑ "Five places for great cochon du lait" Gambit
  • Who Cooked That Up? page on origin of the dish with a recipe
  • “Was He the Eggman?” An account in The New York Times about Lemuel Benedict and the efforts of Jack Benedict, the son of Lemuel's first cousin, to promote Lemuel's story. Article includes link to an audio slide show.
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