Life With….

I think I have a new favorite breakfast.

Breakfast is a meal I both love and am not interested in. I love eggs, and grits, toasts, jams, and sausage bacon. But those are not daily meals. I love grapefruit, but can’t eat it daily for lack of variety, even though my version of Heaven is not complete without fresh squeezed orange or orange/grapefruit juice. I have little to no interest in cereal. This most likely stems from my dislike of all dairy products (except small amounts of butter), and my hatred of hearing other or myself people chewing combined with a dislike of mushy foods thus making it impossible to eat all but hot cereals without hearing chewing, and therefore I eat it only a handful (literally) of times a year. So most days I don’t eat much more then a piece of whole wheat toast, a piece of fruit or have more then a coke zero (odd choice I know for one looking at starting a coffee shop). Hell pancakes and waffles are actually more of a dinner for breakfast thing to me then an actual breakfast meal. I mean who really wants to clean a kitchen first thing in the morning.

But I love eggs, and probably have some version of an egg breakfast without or without toast once a week. My go-tos and lifetime favorites are baked eggs, poached; low heat slow cooked scrambled, French toast, or soft boiled (with the first two eaten most frequently). On rare occasions at a brunch I will venture into Eggs Benedict, cheeseless omelets, or fried eggs. Maybe once a year I make a large frittata with spinach, tomato, and onions and eat it over a week. But now I have found, or more accurately been given something that is filling, rich, healthy. It may not be as easy poached eggs and toast, and more savory then good French Toast (which I love).

This dish is my interoperation of a birthday gift from my brother. Currently stationed in Afghanistan, he, through his 40-year-old translator, has been reaching out a lot to local people there and learning a lot about their foods, customs and culture. Being in the midst of the war, and often on the move leading convoys, I am amazed he remembered at all, but he did remember and he knew of my love of different cultures, cooking and food. Thus he sent me two recipes from his translator, I assume, for my birthday (I am still trying to work out the kinks on the lamb dish – hopefully will post on that later). But here is what he sent, word for word, after which I will explain how I interpreted it.

“Please imagine this is dictated with a soft afghan accent a little broken English” (I can try and make it more intelligible)

Breakfast:
Put oil in pan
When warm
2 onion (slived) when yellow/red
Tomato on top
Green pepper (very spicy and they are called goat horns here no idea where you would get these)
Leave it melted/mixed water be dried
Become like grilled
Add eggs scrambled
Cover it/shake it until sticky
Serve with naan (buy from Arabian or Iranian store)”

Having recently been to a Chinese market, I knew they were likely to have the Goat Horn pepper (though I have made it since with Serrano pepper), along with some good brown rice, Kim Chi. I also knew that whole foods had a passable whole wheat naan that came in four packets, which while not the best it would do. The rest of the ingredients seemed fairly basic pantry items so I felt good to go.

Goat Horn Peppers

On medium heat, I put about a tablespoon of olive oil into a flat pan. While that was heating I sliced a 1 yellow onion and ¾ of a large white onion (I did not want the sweet or red onions but I think they would work well). I put the onion slices into the heated oil, and stirred. While the onion bits started to cook I cut a tomato into eight parts. After placing the tomato onto of the onion and I tackled the pepper, of which I used the red variety. After first removing the seeds I chopped the pepper into little bits and through them onto the onion mix.

This was then allowed to caramelize (melt) and I continued to cook it until most of the released moisture had evaporated and grill charring began to appear on the onion. While I did stir this occasionally, I also cracked the eggs into a ramekin and scrambled them. Once the char marks appeared I threw the eggs in added the eggs and cooked until the eggs were done and all had been stirred (shaken) together and it appeared not wet or dry but done (I assume this is what they meant by stick).

I did not find this mixture needed much – maybe a dash of salt or pepper could be added to taste, but the caramelized onions and fresh tomatoes and peppers add a lot of flavor to the dish, making it hot and savory while still tasting richly seasoned and fresh. Serving it with warmed up naan was a treat, only topped today when I made hot Hibiscus Tea (or Karkaday as it is called in Egypt) with some honey – truly richly flavored nectar of the gods. It kept me full well beyond lunch without being too much food, was flavorful, spicy, and just plain good. And guess what, the eggs, tomato, and onion were local.

Thanks brother, appreciate your thinking of me, and sharing this – hope you don’t mind I passed it on!

All text and copyrights preserved by the author 02csb For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Courtney Brown

Create Your Badge  All text and copyrights preserved by the author for words and original pictures and may not be used without author's permission. For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Follow me on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/peebesalgy or contact me directly through http://www.peebesalgy.com/blog/contact-me/ Courtney Brown | Create Your Badge