A thousand thunders, what do you mean no eggs?*

  Flour and fat done, what's next? Eggs. Let's do eggs. For some reason I feel compelled to start off by pointing what eggs are. (It's probably because you're still a mischievous little tyke. -Ed.) In case you hadn't thought about it, an egg is a chicken's period. (That's it, I quit. Ed.)

  Eggs are mostly water, (75%), then just over 10% each protein and fat. As interesting as that is, it's not in the least bit relevant to the story. What is relevant is the effect eggs have on the recipes they're involved in. I'm sure you've seen a hard boiled egg and are aware of the texture. For the sake of simplicity, I'll describe it as rubbery.​​​​​​​

Tonight's delicious dinner.

  On a practical level, how does it help adding rubber to your dish? I'm glad you asked that and I think the best example is pancakes. The recipe for these bland, thin transporters of delicious fillings is flour, milk and eggs. But occasionally people add that most sumptuous of ingredients, melted butter, for a little extra je ne sais quoi. (For more details, see yesterday's post.)

  Let's remove eggs from the equation and you're now left with flour and milk. Milk is basically fatty water so mix the two together and you've got a thin batter. Make a pancake from this, which is quite possible, and you end up with something quite light, crisp and a bit brittle.

  Chuck a couple of eggs into the mix however, and the resulting pancake will have its signature leathery quality returned. Similarly, thicken some milk and sugar with cornflour and heat it up and you get thick milk, but add a couple of yolks for a lustrous custard. Eggs are a bit like nature's jelly. It's flavourless so once it's been suitably flavoured and diluted, with a bit of fat, (like cream, for example), and you've got the perfect filling for a quiche. Have you got the idea? Good. I'm off.

Kirk out

*From St. Joan by George Bernard Shaw

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