A friend and colleague of mine, Allison Madell, recently wrote a blog post about putting an egg on top of food for her family to give it a different (and nutritious) spin. That reminded me that in the January issue of Bon Appetit magazine, their annually proclaimed “Food of the Year” for 2008 was “Anything with an egg on top”! Remembering this prompted me to search through other culinary and women’s magazines for eggs-on-top recipes in their food pages. Because I scan all magazines with food pages (about 30 of them) for the different ways eggs are being used as part of my job with the American Egg Board, it was easy enough to pull all these recipes. I limited my search to a 4-month period – November 2008 thru February 2009.  I found that an egg-on-top-of-something turned-up 14 times in that short period! Those “somethings” included:

o    Pizza with an egg on top
o    Pasta Carbonara
o    Cold frisse salads, a beef salad, and an Asian mushroom salad, all with an egg on top
o    An egg on top of hashes including beef hash, salmon hash, turkey hash, sausage and potato hash, and kale hash
o    Biscuits with ham and sausage with an egg on top
o    Sausage gravy with an egg on top
o    Everything “Benedict” had an egg on top, including traditional ham and less traditional smoked salmon
o    A bowl of Japanese buckwheat noodles with an egg on top

Of course, these were only a few of the many dishes from around the world that place an egg on top. The Japanese sukiyaki (a stew) dish is served with a raw egg on top and the Korean Bimbimbop is a rice dish served with a raw egg on top. Eggs on top of dishes in France are called ala chervil, and in central Europe, ala Holstein, both terms meaning “on horseback.” A croque madame is an egg-batter-dipped grilled ham and gruyere cheese sandwich served with an egg on top and the traditional steak tartare is served with a raw egg broken on top and mixed into the meat. Warning: for food safety reasons the American Egg Board discourages eating raw eggs in any way.

Did I forget anything? Oops…yes I did! The Italians serve a spinach soup topped with Parmesan cheese and a poached egg on top. I make that myself. The recipe is oh so easy and the dish –when you serve it – is oh so glamorous.  Here’s my own recipe for it:

Spinach Soup with a Poached Egg On Top   (4 servings)

2 14-1/2-oz. can of chicken broth (low-sodium is okay)
1 9-oz. package of frozen chopped spinach, microwaved per package directions
4 poached eggs
4 heaping tablespoons of grated parmesan cheese

Heat the chicken broth until it simmers gently
Meanwhile, be poaching 4 eggs making certain you stop the poaching while the yolks are still runny
Stir the chopped spinach into the broth.
Ladle the broth with spinach into bowls and top each with a poached egg
Sprinkle a generous tablespoon of Parmesan cheese over all of it and serve
(What could be easier for something so delicious?)

This is just a quickie blog to recommend IHOP’s new limited time all-day menu offering of “extreme” hash browns, eggs and pancakes. Two eggs are served anyway you like alongside two pancakes. The hash browns, especially, are amazing!

These hash browns are the chunk potato kind (vs. the shredded potato kind) and what makes them so exceptional is their innovative toppings. I had my hash browns topped with melted Swiss cheese, freshly sautéed mushrooms, sliced green onions and diced ham. They were deeelicious! My friend had his topped with melted Cheddar and Jack cheeses, bacon, sliced green onions and sour cream. He loved it. They also offer sausage and country gravy hash browns.

We both ordered our eggs over-easy and the hash browns made them taste better than ever (if that’s possible). The egg yolks spilled into the potatoes and with all of the toppings I could’ve eaten it all with a spoon! The pancakes, happily, were on a separate plate so as not to interfere.

Here’s the kicker – in my New York area market this meal is $6.99 complete.

I’m inspired. I’ll never again serve plain hash browns with my eggs at home since glamorizing them is so easy!

This blog isn’t about eggs, okay?

Instead, it’s all about walleye. You gotta’ live in the upper Midwest to know about walleye. It’s a fish. It’s not exotic or particularly strong flavored, but I’d rather eat walleye than any other fish because I grew up with it in Chicago. Unfortunately, once you leave the upper Midwest, walleye isn’t around at all. That’s because there’s not a whole lot of it, and what there is of it is all consumed locally around the Great Lakes where it’s caught.

I was recently treated to some amazing walleye during a trip to Champlin Park High School just outside of Minneapolis, where I presented my egg and omelet show to the students at the school’s culinary program. The students are all well-acquainted with me since my instructional video is the centerpiece of the egg curriculum…and they greet me like a rock star whenever I arrive! The program is headed by Chef Chris Sturze, who kindly asked me to have dinner with him and 14 other food and nutrition instructors and their spouses. “Can we pleeeeeze go for walleye?” I begged.

I was taken to the walleye epicenter of the world! The Tavern on Grand in St. Paul is so famous for walleye that it’s nearly all that’s on the menu! In June of 1990 when Mikhail Gorbachev visited the Twin Cities he was taken there for a taste of the Great Lakes’ favorite commodity. I doubt that he enjoyed his walleye more than I enjoyed mine! They prepare their walleye fillets all sorts of ways: pan fried almondine, grilled, battered and fried, Cajun style, blackened, in a sandwich, topped with curry salsa and even as an appetizer in a basket of Buffalo- spiced walleye pieces. Luckily, there were so many of us we were able to order the fish all of the different ways. These were food people. Everyone had to taste everything.

My selection was a plate with two fillets, one battered and fried and the other grilled. They were served with steamed chunks of rutabagas, carrots and onions. I also ordered potato cakes which were seasoned mashed potatoes shaped into pancake-like patties and grilled until crusty. Mmmm. Well, I ate walleye ‘till I cried “uncle!” I had a walleye fix that will surely last me this whole year until I return to Minneapolis/St. Paul once again. Now, I know I probably should have written about eggs, but they just weren’t invited to this party!