One is a relative newcomer that comes with many names and in many colors.
The second is so ubiquitous at the holidays that it has become almost an American inside joke.
And the third has been around since before time.
It’s a possibility that you are sick of me waxing away about how wonderful eggs are; how healthy, how nutritious, how versatile, and still, even now, how inexpensive.
And it’s also possible that this week I am pushing the limits of your culinary patience concerning eggs.
But wait, there’s more!
I know I gave you an easy way to soft boil eggs which makes cleanup and peeling simplified.
And you can live your entire life using that method and leave this earth as a happy, fulfilled ovum eater.
Recently, though, I purchased a product that hath left me shook.
I’m not a big fan of the Tik Tok and Tik Tok product recommendations. I’m not a fan of fad kitchen products. And I’m not a fan of unitaskers.
But what I bought was all three — and I love it.
It’s an egg cooker.
If you type egg cooker into an Amazon search bar, many products will pop up. They go by brand names such as Chefman, Bella, Evoloop. I purchased a Dash. Because it was on sale for $12. I figured if I was buying an egg-cooking lemon, I wasn’t going into debt for it.
It’s just a simple heating element with an insert that holds the eggs. You put a pinhole in each shell, add some water, cover, and start. When the water cooks off, the eggs are done.
The more water you add, the harder cook you get. You can go from liquid yolk to yolk cooked through.
Why is this so much better than the old school way?
Speed and ease of use are biggies. I can soft boil half a dozen eggs in less than five minutes using just one small plug-in appliance.
But as good as that is there’s an added bonus that I didn’t know about until I cooked my first batch. Using this gadget makes peeling the eggs supernaturally easy. I have undercooked the eggs and still, even with a fully liquid yolk, the shell slips off like a French nightgown. It literally pulls away from the egg and rarely takes any white with it.
I love this machine and will fight anyone who tries to take it away.
Number two: crispy onions — you know, the stuff that tops that annual green bean casserole?
I bought it because I planned on making Monterey Spaghetti (see my column from October 2022) when I had Covid and they were part of the recipe.
I made the dish and it was really tasty. But there were leftover onions. So, what’s a girl with a carb fixation and a hatred of wasting food to do?
Well, this girl began liberally sprinkling them on pretty much everything savory in my apartment.
They are terrific on salad. They add both crispiness and an onion kick. Even The Kid, who normally has no love for onions, loves them.
I like them sprinkled on open faced sandwiches, like avocado toast. They’re great on soup. Use them in place of bread or cracker crumb topping. I throw them in any foods that can take a little onion flavor and wants their unique crispy texture.
I use them so much, I purchase in large quantities. Costco stopped carrying the giant sacks of oniony goodness after the holidays, so now my friend Mr. Bezos at Amazon has them regularly shipped to me.
And finally: all salt is sea salt.
Even if it’s mined from deep in the earth or gathered from the Himalayas, which couldn’t be further from the sea.
But once, back millions of years ago, there was an ocean in what is now the sky. And that ocean left behind caverns made of NaCl.
Six thousand years before the Common Era, humans were refining and producing salt. The vast majority of salt used in food is iodized salt, uniform in size and flavor. This is not a bad thing. The iodine added to the salt almost completely eradicated goiters, the disfiguring neck growths that come from a lack of that iodine.
But like a huge swath of food and cooking, salt has gotten glamorous.
Varieties, such as untreated sea salt in many different grinds, are readily available, as well as Kosher salt, a coarser, larger grain that is so beloved of cooks of all stripes.
But there is another kind of salt: finishing salt. Large flakes of diamond-clear salt that is perfect sprinkled on top of a finished dish. When eaten like this one gets a salty hit and a crunch that adds so much to the enjoyment of the food.
It also makes a visually impressive finish to sweets such as chocolate and/or caramel.
So, no recipe this week, but an assignment for you, Gentle Reader.
If you try one of these products, let me know how you liked them.
If you have a terrific new food/cooking acquisition, let me know what it is and what you think of it (even duds can teach us something, but if not, at least possibly function as a hilarious cautionary tale).
Thanks for your time.
Contact me at dm@bullcity.mom.