Egg Poached Tomato

I think you know you’ve gone too far down the path of foodie-dom when you decide that anything can be stuffed.  That Eggplant? Stuff it.  That Zucchini? Stuff it.  That Pepper? DUH.  Stuff it.  That Potato? Double Stuff it.  That Chicken? Stuff it.  That Over-Sized Piece of Hollow Pasta? Stuff it.  That tomato? Well…yes…stuff it.

Food is such a wonderful malleable art form.  We often eat dishes in whole parts–a chicken breast here, a floret of broccoli there–but food gets really interesting, and I do mean really interesting, when we start taking risks.  Those risks can be as simple as hollowing out a tomato and poaching an egg in it for your Sunday morning breakfast.   Or, it can be as difficult as tweezing–yes, using tweezers–to place individual Italian Parlsey leaves around a steak at one of New York’s fanciest restaurants.

For me, it was the tomato.  A great starting point for we stuffers anonymous.

A great, roasted tomato is a beautiful thing–sweet, juicy, condensed, and flavorful, it gets even better if you remove the seedy juicy parts and let the shell do the talking.  Fill with fresh spinach, parmesan, some caramelized onion, garlic, and a poached tomato, and voila! The ultimate stuffed tomato.

Egg Poached Tomato

This recipe was inspired by my love of roasted tomatoes and poached eggs.  Something about eggs and tomatoes just goes perfectly together (see my recipe for Sun Dried Tomato & Spinach Omelette).

Ingredients:

* 1 oversized ripe red tomato

* 1 egg

* Salt & pepper to taste

* 1 handful spinach

* 1/8 cup onion, chopped fine

* 2 cloves garlic, minced or pressed

* 1/4 cup Parmesan

* 1 tablespoon olive oil

1.) Preheat oven to 350F.  Prep your ingredients: carve out the top of an oversized tomato and scoop out the insides.  Chop onion and brown with 2 pressed cloves garlic and one tablespoon olive oil.

2.) Begin filling the tomato: line the bottom with a healthy serving of parmesan.

3.) Cover Parmesan in spinach.

4.) Top spinach with onions and garlic.

5.) Carefully, crack an egg into the tomato, and dress in shaved parmesan and salt and pepper.

6.) Roast in oven for less than 15 minutes, making sure to check the tomato a few minutes before.  You don’t want the egg to overcook, but to be warm, runny, and delicious.  Remove oven if the egg is beginning to look too well-done, but it will most likely take the dish 15 whole minutes or maybe a minute or two more.

Plate and enjoy! Makes 1 serving.

–Helana Brigman

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