You can make many other egg dishes by changing the basic methods a little. For example, you can make a Fried Egg Sandwich by putting a fried egg between slices of bread and adding other sandwich ingredients. Or you can make Picture-Frame Eggs, Toad-in-the-Hole or Bull’s-Eye by cutting a hole in a slice of bread or a waffle and frying an egg in the hole.
French Toast
To make French Toast, start out beating the eggs just like you would for scrambled eggs. Then, dip bread slices in the beaten eggs and cook the bread like you would cook fried eggs. If you put savory sandwich ingredients between French toast slices before you cook them, you’ll have a Monte Cristo Sandwich, a Croque Monsieur or a Croque Madame.
An Italian-style Treat
For an Italian-style treat, you can make Spaghetti Carbonara by heating spaghetti and crumbled cooked bacon, then scrambling in some eggs. Chinese-style Fried Rice is made the same way using cooked rice, bits of cooked meat or vegetables, soy sauce and scrambled eggs. Add Oriental ingredients to an omelet mixture and cook it in a small circle to make Egg Foo Yung patties. Or swirl scrambled eggs into chicken broth to make Egg Drop Soup.
Fancy Eggs Benedict
Fancy Eggs Benedict is simply poached eggs with slices of Canadian bacon sitting on English muffin halves and topped with a Hollandaise sauce. Instead of poaching eggs in water, some cooks like to poach an egg in soup for a hearty meal in a bowl. Shirred Eggs are very comforting and are easy to make by cooking eggs with milk in a pan, then sprinkling them with bread crumbs.
Eggs Florentine
Eggs Florentine can be fried, poached or sliced or wedged hard-cooked eggs sitting on plain cooked spinach or creamed spinach. Huevos Rancheros are fried or poached eggs sitting on a tortilla spread with salsa and topped with shredded cheese.
Hard Cooked Eggs
You can even make an Egg Pizza by topping a pizza crust or an English muffin half with pizza ingredients and scrambled eggs or hard-cooked egg slices.There are all kinds of other things you can do with hard-cooked eggs. Some people like Egg Salad made by stirring together chopped hard-cooked eggs, a dressing and flavoring ingredients. Other people like to put chopped, sliced or wedged hard-cooked eggs into green salads or potato or macaroni salads. Deviled Eggs are easy-to-make favorites, too. Just mash hard-cooked egg yolks with a fork and stir them together with a dressing and flavoring ingredients. Then, spoon the yolk mixture into hard-cooked egg white halves.
You can also stir chopped hard-cooked eggs into a white sauce (a milk sauce thickened with flour) to make Creamed Eggs. If you mash the yolks separately and sprinkle them on top of Creamed Eggs, you’ll have Eggs Goldenrod. Or, with sunny hard-cooked eggs, you can make a hard-cooked Egg Curry, Egg Submarine Sandwich, Egg Casserole or Egg Dip. Pickled Eggs are hard-cooked eggs soaked in a mixture of vinegar and seasonings. Scotch Eggs are hard-cooked eggs coated with sausage and crumbs and then baked or fried.
Learn how to perfect hard boiled eggs here
Desserts
Some famous desserts are just fancy custards. Creme Brulee is a cup of custard with sugar broiled on top until it’s crisp and brown. Creme Caramel is custard with melted sugar on the bottom of the cup. When the custard is turned upside down to get it out of the cup, the melted sugar flows over the top. Flan is a very rich Creme Caramel baked in pie plate or a cake pan.
Stirred custard can be made with vanilla or other flavorings and served as a thick, pourable Custard Sauce on fruit or cake. When stirred custard is layered with pound cake, sponge cake or ladyfingers (finger-shaped pieces of sponge cake) plus fruit and jam, it’s called English Trifle. If you use just the yolks to make a soft custard, you can beat the whites and some sugar into puffy meringue clouds. Then, if you poach the meringue puffs and float them in the custard, you’ll have a Floating Island dessert. Or you can turn a stirred custard into Eggnog by thinning it with milk or cream and adding flavorings, if you like. You can also make a stirred custard into Custard Ice Cream by adding cream and flavoring ingredients and freezing it.
Forgotten Cookies and Macaroons, Chocolate Mousse, Ice-Box Cake, Marshmallows, frostings like Seven-Minute Frosting and Royal Icing, a white fudge called Divinity and even the Nougat center that’s in some candies are all recipes that start with a meringue.
Other sweets made with eggs are Cream Puffs and Éclairs and most cakes like Angel Food Cake, Cheesecake, Chiffon Cake, Fruitcake, Jelly Roll, Pound Cake, Sponge Cake and Torte. Eggs are important in some pies, too. You need eggs for any kind of Chiffon Pie or Cream Pie plus French Silk, Key Lime, Lemon Meringue, Pecan, Pumpkin and Sweet Potato Pies.
Dressings
Green Goddess Dressing, Thousand Island Dressing and Tartar Sauce are all simply Mayonnaise with different seasonings and Béarnaise Sauce is a seasoned Hollandaise Sauce.
Some recipes don’t have very many eggs in them and don’t look very eggy when they’re done. But, without eggs, they wouldn’t work very well! Pancakes, Crepes and Waffles are like this. Eggs also bind together the small pieces of foods that are in Meatloaf, Croquettes and Fish and Seafood Cakes. Eggs keep these foods from crumbling and falling apart into pieces.
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Wow! What a list!
Since eggs can be used in so many different ways to make so many different things, they’re called a versatile food. Because eggs are so versatile, some chefs call eggs “the cement that holds together the castle of cuisine” (a fancy word that means cooking).
With so many ways to eat eggs, your favorite way could be a recipe for breakfast, lunch, dinner or a snack. It could also be a main dish, side dish or dessert. Eggs can be used for any meal of the day and for any part of a meal.
For more information about each cooking method, read more: https://www.incredibleegg.org/eggcyclopedia/