Good afternoon. Who made muffins? Good stuff, right?
I promised you meatballs, and I was excited, and you were excited, and then: my oven broke. (This must be what it feels like for all of you when Slack goes down.)
Do you have to use an oven to cook meatballs? No. But should you use an oven to cook them? Yes. And why is that? Unfortunately, you’ll have to wait until Samsung ships me a new motherboard to find out.
While we wait, let’s talk about eggs instead. Today’s recipe is for saag-shuka - a veg-heavy, delightfully verdant version of shakshouka, or Eggs In Purgatory. This is one of those science-light issues, so there’s not a ton of text to slog through: even if you hit up every subsection, it should only take you about 5 minutes to read. If you do, and you like it, then maybe consider forwarding this to just one person that you think might enjoy it, too? (I don’t shill for myself often enough; thanks for tolerating me when I do. xo.)
Reader Q.
Today, this is also going to qualify as the Links section - double whammy!
Question: “Tell me all your thoughts on garlic. Also if you pick my question, please tell everyone to read that with a Dishwalla inflection.” - Q.C., Philadelphia
Answer: Done and done. There’s a lot to know about garlic - about how to prepare and use it, specifically - and in the interest of brevity, I’ll just direct you to these pieces on Serious Eats that cover a lot of the relevant science. (That last one is the most valuable one, in my opinion.) I am not one of those people who starts every dish with an entire bulb of garlic, and that is largely because I think peeling garlic is a massive pain in the ass. Sometimes, kitchen work is worth the trouble; sometimes, a dish just isn’t the best version of itself unless you peel an entire bulb of garlic. But garlic is not a wallflower - it is so assertive - and I think we’re often too heavy-handed with it. Garlic is an allium, like onions and scallions and chives and shallots and leeks, but it’s not as interchangeable and not as forgiving as its sweeter, milder brethren. I know so many people (and this is not a dig - it’s just an observation) who automatically double or even quadruple the amount of garlic called for when making a meal, and it’s just baffling to me: beyond a certain point, it’s not adding more flavor, it’s just creating a striking, biting imbalance. But, to be fair, I am probably guilty of doing that in certain preparations with things like vanilla or black pepper, so I guess TL;DR my thoughts on garlic are: read those articles, and, to each their own.
Saag-shuka
Or: Eggs in Literally Anything You Want.
Shakshouka and Eggs In Purgatory are wildly-popular and crazy-simple cousins: eggs gently poached in warm, thick baths of spiced, stewed tomatoes. Showered with fresh herbs and served with some kind of warm bread, these cousins have a lot going for them: they are affordable, deeply flavorful, high in protein, quick, and require no special skill or tool or technique. Low-effort, high-reward; that’s what everyone’s after in the kitchen, right?
Faced with a bunch of leftover saag one day, I thought, “Oh, I could swirl this into my shakshouka,” but quickly realized that I didn’t really need the spicy tomato sauce at all: the saag already had the flavor and the texture that I wanted. And thus, saag-shuka was born, and I’ve never gone back.
This recipe is really a recipe for saag - the -shuka part is just a matter of technique, of breaking eggs into soft, welcoming wells and letting them poach gently. So to that end, if you have a preferred recipe for saag, you can use it, and if you’d rather do as little cooking as possible, you could buy a high-quality frozen saag or even just order some from your favorite Indian takeout place. This is great way to stretch leftovers.
And really, I like to think of saag-shuka as a permission, as a gateway drug: once you’ve allowed yourself to poach eggs in something other than a spicy tomato sauce, you have to start asking yourself, “What can’t I poach my eggs in?” Consider all of these alternatives and swaps:
» If you’re not into the warm Indian spices, you could swap in anything: a favorite Thai curry paste, jerk seasoning, lots of fresh ginger and lime and coconut milk.
» Skip the spices altogether and go for a garlicky, creamy version with lots of shallots and maybe even some artichokes and maybe MAYBE even some cheese. Did I just give you permission to eat spinach dip with a spoon for dinner - or even for breakfast? I did. Love you.
» If you want even more veggie power, nothing’s stopping you from mixing in some finely chopped broccoli or rapini, cauliflower, summer squash, haricots vert, root veg, Bell peppers, eggplant - anything, really, that you like. This stews just long enough to soften most vegetables, so long as you keep the size of the dice quite small.
» Want less veggie power? I hear you. You could poach eggs in leftover risotto, or exceptionally saucy pasta, or a savory oatmeal. Refried beans or a tasty daal? Buttery, silky mashed potatoes? What about leftover chili or Sloppy Joe goodness? Oh, or what about taco filling: poach your eggs in that and add some cheese; you could serve it with warm tortillas, or even some chips.
» The thing that’s great about this limitless world of -shoukas is that they are all warming and soothing: they’re cozy enough to eat with a spoon. But don’t forget to add some texture and brightness: whatever you use to make it, it will welcome any topping you want to throw at it with open arms. Think: fresh herbs, pickled onions or vegetables, a squeeze of citrus, chili crisp, dukkah, some salty garlicky breadcrumbs, seeds or nuts, yogurt, wasabi Kewpie.
What do you say?
Saag-Shuka
Ingredients
Eight cups of tender mixed greens, washed and chopped
It sounds like a lot, but greens cook down dramatically.
Spinach, kale, chard, mustard greens, escarole - use whatever!
If you want to use a cup or two of additional vegetables for heft, that’s fine - see above for ideas! - but add, don’t substitute; you need all of these greens to achieve the correct level of sauciness for poaching.
Olive oil, coconut oil, or ghee - 2-3 tablespoons, enough to coat the skillet
1 medium onion (the size of a baseball), peeled and diced
2-inch knob of ginger, peeled and minced
2-3 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced (and degermed!)
fresh chilies, chopped - quantity and kind of your choice
1 teaspoon of whole cumin or fennel seeds
1 teaspoon EACH of ground coriander and cumin
1 medium tomato (size of a baseball!), chopped
Or you can use a high-quality can of diced - just drain it first.
1/2 cup of heavy cream or coconut milk
salt
4 whole eggs
Fresh cilantro
Instructions
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Once it’s rolling, drop in your greens and blanche them for about one minute, then drain.
Or, you can use this trick I recently saw: place all of your greens in a large colander and set it in the sink. Bring a teakettle of water to a boil, and then pour it over your greens; let rest for 5 minutes, and done! Handy.
Place the blanched greens into the jar of a food processor and pulse into a rough paste. If you need to add 1/4 cup of water to get things going, no big deal - go ahead.
In a large, deep skillet, warm the oil or ghee over medium-high heat, then add the onions, garlic, ginger, chilis, and dry spices. Fry until fragrant and the alliums are beginning to crisp and color, 3-5 minutes.
Add the tomatoes to the skillet and allow their acidic juices to deglaze any crispy bits.
Add the processed, finely chopped greens to the pan, pour in the cream or coconut milk, and fold everything gently to incorporate.
Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20-25 minutes - the greens will soften and release a lot of liquid, and you want to simmer most of it away.
Once the saag has thickened, add salt to taste and adjust any other seasonings to your liking: add more cream if it’s too spicy, some cayenne if it’s not spicy enough, a squeeze of citrus if it needs brightening. This is your rodeo.
A little note: if you want to make your saag ahead of time, that’s totally fine: it will keep in the fridge for 3-4 days, and in the freezer indefinitely. Just warm it (or any of the above suggestions!) in a skillet until it returns to a simmer before moving onto the next step.
Using the back of a spoon, make four large wells in a circle around the edge of the skillet. Crack an egg into each well, and cook without stirring until the egg whites are set, about 7-9 minutes. (Alternatively, you can cover the pan with a lid OR place it in a 400F oven, and the eggs will cook in about half the time - but the yolks won’t be visible, if that matters to you.)
Sprinkle generously with handfuls of fresh cilantro (or parsley, or some chives, or scallion greens) and serve immediately with grilled bread, or warm naan or pita, or fresh tortillas, or whatever you want. Lovely with a dollop of thick yogurt or some pickled onions or both.
Butterpat.
A little something extra.
Speaking of pickled onions: I love and can not get enough of them, and if you’re not making a jar to keep in your fridge to use any time your heart desires, you are not fully living. (My emotions about my oven are making me super dramatic.) They level up so many dishes, effortlessly: tacos, quesadillas, poke, rice bowls, soups, sandwiches, -shukas.
I like to start with this recipe, but I think it misses the mark in two tiny ways: it’s crazy sweet, which is not terrible but also not my preference, and the onions are not as pretty as they could be (I told you: dramatic). But here’s an easy solution: drop the cup of sugar, and replace it with 1 tablespoon of honey and one cup of store-bought frozen blueberries. I know that sounds absolutely bananas, but if you add the blueberries and honey to the brine and boil for 5 minutes, you’ll be rewarded with the most beautiful pinky-purple onions that are so delightfully balanced: they’re savory and spicy and salty and zippy, with a really nice fruity floral backbone and which are only faintly sweet. I like the frozen wild Maine blueberries from Trader Joe’s for this - they’re inexpensive and I love their flavor. Whatever you use, just strain them from the brine and discard before pouring over the onions. Enjoy.