Brunch: It's what's for dinner.

A few weeks ago, the husband and I had the most amazing brunch at Buttermilk Channel down the road in Carroll Gardens. The service was great. The vibe relaxed and sophisticated. And they let us keep Jordan the dog next to our table outside. I had this amazing thing: poached eggs on biscuits with a hollandaise sauce.

A week or so later, I was sitting at home watching Marley and Me (sniff) and trying to decide what to eat for dinner. I had made some cornbread, which was not that great. I still have to find a good cornbread recipe. I used Alice Waters' recipe from The Art of Simple Food, and it lacked the necessary fat (butter, bacon grease, oil, whatever) to make the bread moist. But I still decided to use it as my substitute biscuit and put an egg on top of it for dinner. The only problem is that I've only ever made scrambled eggs and wanted to make an egg where the yolk would stay intact until I plunged my fork into it and then I'd get all the eggy goodness on my cornbread. Thankfully, Alice has good directions for this.

Alice says that the key to cooking good eggs is to use the right pan--a seasoned cast iron pan. Unfortunately, that's on my Christmas list right now, so I had to go with my normal small fryer. She says to:
1. Warm the pan over medium heat.
2. Turn the heat to low and add a piece of butter and swirl the pan to cover the bottom of the pan with the melting butter.
3. Gently crack open an egg into the pan.
4. Lightly salt and pepper the egg and cook until the white is almost completely set--which means it's turning white, and the clear is almost gone and solid.
5. Gently coax a spatula under the egg, and with a smooth motion turn it over in the pan without breaking the yolk. You can't have any fear as you do this. The egg will tell if you're scared and break.
6. Season the egg again with salt and pepper.
7. For a runny yolk, cook for just a few seconds more. More a firmer yolk, leave it in for about another minute.

Here is the egg as it's setting, before I'm about to flip:


And after the successful flip:

And then on top of the cornbread, with the runny yolk. Delish!