Right before the Pig opened, I was working eighteen hours a day with my sous-chef and a line cook, trying to get everything ready. For a week, we operated on four hours of sleep a night and practically nothing to eat. We were so busy we didn’t notice. This is what I cooked for our first real meal, which I guess you’d call breakfast. There’s sweetness from the squash, heat from the chilli, sweet-and-salty from the pancetta, and creamy relief from the egg. I like to scoop a big hunk of squash, pop it onto the toast, and smoosh it down, leaving some smooth and some with a little texture.
serves 4
2 medium garlic cloves, smashed and peeled
2 heaped tablespoons marjoram leaves
4 teaspoons coriander seeds, toasted and ground
(see Spices, here)
100ml plus 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Maldon or another flaky sea salt
8 or so dried pequin chillies or pinches of red pepper flakes
One 675g butternut squash, halved lengthwise and seeds scooped out
8 thin slices pancetta
4 large eggs
4 Bruschetta (see Toast and Bruschetta, here)
Preheat the oven to 230°C/450°F/gas 8.
Chop the garlic with the marjoram until you have a very fine, well-blended mixture. Combine this mixture with the ground coriander, 100ml of the olive oil, and 1 tablespoon salt in a large mixing bowl. Crumble in 5 of the chillies and stir well.
Put the squash, one half at a time, into the bowl and use your hands to coat it all over with the oil and seasonings. Put the halves cut sides up in a baking dish and drizzle them with any oil left in the bowl. Pour 100ml water around the squash, cover the dish tightly with two layers of foil, and pop it into the oven. Roast the squash until you can slide a knife into the thickest part of the flesh without resistance, about 45 minutes. Remove the foil, flip the squash halves so the cut sides face down, and roast for about 10 minutes more, until the cut sides are just a bit brown. Set the dish aside in a warm place.
Pour the remaining 3 tablespoons olive oil into a medium non-stick pan and set it over high heat. Once the oil begins to smoke, add 4 slices of the pancetta. Once they shrink up, add the rest. Cook the pancetta, stirring it a bit, until it’s brown at the edges but still floppy, 3 to 4 minutes. Transfer to kitchen paper to drain, and reserve the fat in a bowl.
Scoop out the squash with a spoon and spread a good bit of it on each bruschetta.
Pour some of the pancetta fat (a generous tablespoon per egg) back into the pan (fry the eggs in two batches if you must) and set it over medium-high heat. When the fat is barely smoking, crack the eggs into the pan. You should hear spitting and sizzling when you add them. That means the whites will get crispy on the edges. When the whites begin to set, sprinkle the eggs with a little salt and as much crushed chilli as you’d like. Cook the eggs as you prefer – I like mine over easy for this recipe, with runny yolks.
Top each bruschetta with an egg and then 2 slices of the pancetta. Serve straight away.
BAKED EGGS WITH ANCHOVIES AND CREAM
On those rare relaxed mornings when I have the time to flip through the paper, I make myself these baked eggs. Cream and anchovies make a lovely couple – the result isn’t fishy. Rather, the anchovy fades into the background, sneaking its salty umami quality into every bite. I like to dip my spoon in and spread the eggs on olive-oil–lashed charred slices of crusty bread.
serves 4
1 large garlic clove, crushed and peeled
1 teaspoon rosemary leaves
About 25g unsalted butter
3 whole salt-packed anchovies, rinsed, soaked, and filleted
(see Filleting Salt-Packed Anchovies, here)
6 tablespoons double cream
¼ teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
4 large eggs
A few dried pequin chillies or pinches of red pepper flakes
Maldon or another flaky sea salt
4 teaspoons crème fraîche
Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/gas 6.
Finely chop the garlic with the rosemary until the mixture looks a bit like blue cheese.
Put half the butter in a medium pan set over medium-high heat and bring it to a froth. Add the garlic and rosemary mixture and give the pan a little shake. When the garlic starts to go brown and nutty, about a minute, add the anchovy fillets, give the pan another little shake, and turn off the heat. Stir the anchovies until they break up. Have a smell – to me, anchovies smell crispy as they cook. Pour in the cream, add the lemon zest, and stir some more. Turn the heat back to medium-high, bring to the boil, then remove from the heat.
Rub four 225g ramekins with the remaining butter. Put the ramekins in a medium baking dish, split the cream mixture evenly among them, and crack an egg into each one. Roughly crumble on the chillies and sprinkle a pinch of salt over each yolk. Add a dollop of crème fraîche to each ramekin. Pour just enough water into the baking dish so the water level reaches a little past the level of the cream in the ramekins.
Carefully transfer the baking dish to the middle rack in the oven and cook just until the whites have set completely and the yolks are still creamy, about 20 minutes. Remove the baking dish from the oven and let the ramekins sit in the water for 2 minutes. Use sturdy tongs to carefully remove them from the water. Serve straight away.
PORRIDGE
My granddad used to make the best porridge. Whenever he did, I’d think about Goldilocks: Granddad’s porridge was never too runny or too thick – it was always just right. He’d simmer rolled oats in milk, and it always smelled so sweet and inviting. Even today, the thought of it makes me go all warm inside. Next, he’d spoon the porridge into a bowl and let it sit until it formed a little skin and began to pull away from the sides. Then my favourite part: he’d pour milk into the space around the edges, the cool milk hitting the hot porridge and making it set like custard. Finally, he’d sprinkle sugar over the middle. The hot porridge, the crunchy sugar, the moat of milk – it was so comforting. Just the thing for cold mornings when there was frost on the ground, and you knew that pretty soon you’d have to leave the house all wrapped up in your scarf, bobble hat, and mitts and pop off to school. These days, I’ll sometimes add a bit of crumbled dried chilli to my porridge. It goes especially nicely with maple syrup.
serves 4
325ml whole milk, plus a few generous splashes
1½ teaspoons Maldon or another flaky sea salt
35g pinhead oats
35g rolled oats (not ‘quick-cooking’ or ‘instant’)