Eggs Benedict

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox food Eggs Benedict is a common American breakfast or brunch dish, consisting of two halves of an English muffin, each topped with Canadian bacon or sliced ham, a poached egg, and hollandaise sauce. The dish is believed to have originated in New York City, although a number of different origin stories exist.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Origin and history

The cross section of a serving of eggs Benedict

There are multiple conflicting accounts as to the origin of eggs Benedict.

Delmonico's in Lower Manhattan says on its menu that "Eggs Benedict was first created in our ovens in 1860."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> One of its former chefs, Charles Ranhofer, also published the recipe for Eggs à la Benedick in 1894.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In an interview recorded in the "Talk of the Town" column of The New Yorker in 1942, the year before his death,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Lemuel Benedict, a then-retired Wall Street stock broker, said that he had wandered into the Waldorf Hotel in 1894 and, hoping to find a cure for his morning hangover, ordered "buttered toast, poached eggs, crisp bacon, and a hooker of hollandaise". Oscar Tschirky, the maître d'hôtel, was so impressed with the dish that he put it on the breakfast and luncheon menus but substituted ham for the bacon and a toasted English muffin for the toast.<ref name = newyorker1942>Template:Cite news Notes: This hasn't been verified at the source, but is instead taken from the letter to Karpf by Cutts Benedict and the page of J. J. Schnebel.</ref>

Eggs Atlantic (i.e. Eggs Royale) with smoked salmon in place of Canadian bacon

A later claim to the creation of eggs Benedict was circuitously made by Edward P. Montgomery on behalf of Commodore E. C. Benedict. In 1967 Montgomery wrote a letter to then The New York Times food columnist Craig Claiborne, which included a recipe he said he had received through his uncle, a friend of the commodore. Commodore Benedict's recipe—by way of Montgomery—varies greatly from Ranhofer's version, particularly in the hollandaise sauce preparation—calling for the addition of a "hot, hard-cooked egg and ham mixture".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

The modern version differs slightly from these early versions and has a split English muffin, topped with Canadian bacon or ham, lightly poached egg, and covered in hollandaise sauce, which is made from eggs, lemon, and melted butter.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Variations

Eggs Florentine with spinach in place of Canadian bacon

It is popular to make variations on eggs Benedict, and some of the most popular are eggs florentine (spinach replaces bacon), eggs royale (smoked salmon replaces bacon), eggs Sardou (spinach and artichoke replaces bacon and muffin), eggs neptune (crab replaces bacon), and eggs cochon (pulled pork replaces bacon and buttermilk biscuit replaces the muffin).<ref name=":3">Template:Cite web</ref> In many cases it has become popular to simply replace the word eggs with the meat that replaces the bacon, for example, rather than eggs neptune, crab benedict, even though the recipe still has two poached eggs.<ref name=":3" /> Examples of this are steak benedict<ref name=":2" /> or salmon benedict, and replacements include corned beef, fried chicken, or shrimp.<ref name=":2" />

Many variations of eggs Benedict exist, the most common involve replacing the bacon or English muffin, or both:

• Avocado toast eggs Benedict – substitutes toast in place of the muffin and adds sliced avocado.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• California eggs Benedict – adds sliced Hass avocado. Variations may include sliced tomato instead of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":1">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Balmoral – substitutes haggis in place of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Blackstone – substitutes streaky bacon in place of Canadian bacon and adds a tomato slice.<ref>Template:Cite book Here the recipe is called poached eggs Blackstone. It uses a fried slice of flour-dipped tomato, minced bacon, poached eggs, and hollandaise. No bread for base.</ref>
• Eggs Blanchard – substitutes béchamel sauce in place of Hollandaise.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Canadiana Eggs Benedict - substitutes Montreal smoked meat in place of Canadian bacon and mixes maple syrup in the Hollandaise sauce.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Chesapeake (crab eggs Benedict, crab cakes Benedict) – substitutes a Maryland blue crab cake in place of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Eggs Cochon served at New Orleans restaurant

Crab and asparagus eggs benedict, served in Maine

• Eggs Cochon (eggs cochon de lait) – substitutes pork "debris" (slow roasted pork shredded in its own juices) in place of Canadian bacon, buttermilk biscuit in place of the English muffin. Served in New Orleans restaurants.<ref>"Eggs Cochon du Lait" Eat Your World</ref><ref>"Five places for great cochon du lait"Gambit Template:Webarchive</ref>
• Eggs Florentine – adds spinach, sometimes substituted in place of the Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite news </ref> Older versions of eggs Florentine add spinach to poached or shirred eggs. The cheese gruyère mornay is added, though sometimes hollandaise is subbed.<ref name=":0" />
• Eggs Hebridean – a Scottish variety, substitutes black pudding in place of the Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Hussarde – substitutes Holland rusks in place of the English muffin and adds Bordelaise sauce.<ref name = demers1998>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name = Brennans >Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Mornay – substitutes Mornay sauce in place of the Hollandaise.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
• Eggs Neptune – substitutes crab meat in place of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Steak Benedict – substitutes a small steak in place of Canadian bacon and sometimes replaces the Hollandaise with béarnaise.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":2">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs RoyaleTemplate:Refn – substitutes salmon which may be smoked, in place of Canadian bacon.<ref name="ATLANTIC">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Trivette – adds Creole mustard to the Hollandaise and a topping of crayfish.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Sardou – a 19th-century New Orleans variation that has poached eggs with artichoke hearts, creamed spinach, and hollandaise sauce.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Woodhouse – includes two eggs and artichoke hearts, creamed spinach, bechamel sauce, Iberico ham, black truffle and beluga caviar. The recipe is featured in the book How To Archer, inspired by the television series Archer on FXX.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Eggs Zenedict – adds toasted scone and peameal bacon smothered in sundried tomato Hollandaise. A specialty of restaurants in the defunct Canadian retail chain Zellers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Huevos Benedictos – adds sliced avocado or Mexican chorizo, topped with salsa (such as Template:Lang or Template:Lang) and Hollandaise sauce.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Irish Benedict – substitutes corned beef or Irish bacon in place of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Miner's Benedict – substitutes slices of fried Black pudding in place of the Canadian bacon.<ref name=":4">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Mushroom Benedict – substitutes grilled flat mushrooms in place of the Canadian bacon.<ref name=":4" />
• New Jersey Benedict – substitutes Taylor pork roll in place of Canadian bacon.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Crab cake benedict, replacing bacon and muffin with a crab cake

Some variations involve replacing the Canadian bacon, such as lobster benedict, corned beef, or steak benedict. In other cases the bread might be changed from an English muffin, to toast, sliced potato, or a biscuit.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> One popular variation is to replace the Canadian bacon with smoke salmon, and it has gather a large number of names from Eggs Royale, Atlantic, Montreal, and others, and some regions have a local name for this variation.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Meatless Eggs Benedict may omit the Canadian bacon altogether, or replace it with something else such as avocado, tomato, mushroom, or tofu.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> There is a version of California Eggs Benedict that replaces the Canadian bacon with sliced tomato and avocado.<ref name=":1" />

Eggs benedict has also been made into breakfast sandwich by adding an additional English muffin half on top.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

A version which replaces the sauce, is Eggs Halifax, which substitutes New England clam chowder for hollandaise.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

See also

• List of breakfast foods
• List of brunch foods
• List of egg dishes
• List of foods named after people
• List of regional dishes of the United States

External links

• “Was He the Eggman?” An account in The New York Times about Lemuel Benedict and the efforts of Jack Benedict, the son of Lemuel's first cousin, to promote Lemuel's story. Article includes link to an audio slide show.