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Let me explain: the most delicious egg dishes don’t ever hit the oven. Through culinary experiments, realizing that using a cover creates a steamy environment for cooking the egg tops, resulting in perfectly cooked delicately prepared egg with a tender white plus liquid yolk. Direct oven heat from baking is much more aggressive than steam, typically causing to dry everything out and overcook the yolk. Here are two sauce options as a jumping-off point, encouraging customization. Option one involves a straightforward golden coconut sauce, whereas the spicy sausage sauce reimagines traditional spicy eggs, essentially, eggs baked in spicy tomato sauce.

Turmeric Coconut Curry Steamed Eggs (pictured above)

Prep A quick 10 minutes
Cook Just under an hour
Yields Two people

Extra virgin oil
1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
Sea salt
Two garlic cloves, crushed and chopped
10g fresh ginger, minced ginger
1 tbsp ground turmeric
½ tbsp cumin seeds
Curry leaves
200ml coconut milk
Chickpeas
Basil leaves, and additional for topping
Fresh eggs
Fresh chilies, thinly cut, to serve

Use a heavy skillet over medium-high flame. Pour in some oil, incorporate onions seasoned with salt, sauté for several minutes. Mix in garlic, ginger, and spices, let them sizzle, occasionally stirring briefly, then tip in the coconut milk including chickpea can contents. Let it bubble, lower heat to gentle cook, and leave it to tick over for half an hour, when sauce is rich and yellow. Add salt to taste, mix in fresh basil.

Use the back of a spoon making four indentations in the sauce, break eggs into each. Sprinkle the top of each egg with a little salt, then cover the pan with a lid, simmer over low heat for a few minutes, until egg whites firm with yolks still runny. Turn off stove, finish with a few extra basil leaves and sliced chilies, and serve.

Spicy Sausage Sauce with Tangy Peppers Steamed Eggs

Prep 10 minutes
Cooking time 45 min
Serves Two

Olive oil
Spicy lamb sausages
Harissa paste
Toasted cumin
2 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
400g good-quality tinned tomatoes
Fine sea salt
Fresh eggs
1 handful pickled peppers, diced
Fresh parsley, diced
3 tbsp thick Greek yoghurt
1 lemon, cut into wedges, to serve

Heat a skillet at moderate temperature. Drizzle olive oil and, once it’s warm, peel sausages and break off pieces into the skillet, like mini balls. Turn down the heat, brown the meat slowly, extracting spicy fats. Roll the merguez pieces around the pan while cooking, so they colour on all sides.

After browning, incorporate harissa, cumin, and garlic to the pot, adjust to moderate flame fry with mixing, for three to four minutes, until aromatic, and the garlic has lost its raw edge. Tip in the tomatoes, salt to taste and bring to a simmer. Turn down the heat to low and simmer slowly for twenty minutes. Sauce will thicken, become richer and darker, while the oils split and rise to the top.

Use the back of a spoon forming wells across base, add eggs individually. Season eggs with a little salt, place lid on pan. Simmer briefly over a low heat, until the whites are set and yolks warmed.

Remove from heat, finish with chopped pickled peppers, herbs, yogurt dollop, and a drizzle of oil, accompanied by lemon.