Eggs are versatile. Used as an ingredient in an appetizer
through dessert or served during breakfast to dinner. To prove it’s flexibility,
41 restaurants across Toronto are showcasing an egg dish on their menu from October
18 to November 30, 2024, for the Dine With Eggs event.
Lucky me, I sampled six of their creations at the launch.
And while there were a lot of egg sandwiches, each had their own twist.
The Croque a la Daisy is that gets-you-out-of-bed
after a night of drinking breakfast sandwich from Lazy Daisy's Café. Their
version of a croque madame starts with a rosemary cheddar biscuit encasing a fried
egg complete with Black Forest ham, Gruyère, and a Parmesan crisp. It’s hearty,
especially with the white sausage gravy topping the biscuit, but everything
works together and somehow the egg helps tone down the other ingredients.
Alma + Gil swaps out the ham for slow cooked porchetta and
the biscuit with a brioche bun in their porchetta breakfast sando. The sunny-side-up
egg is topped with chimichurri, truffle mustard aioli, Parmesan, and a bit of
the pork’s crackling for texture. While I would have liked the bun warmed,
there’s a delicateness to the sandwich that makes it almost refreshing.
It’s a complete opposite to Hot Pork’s BBQ combo where
smoked brisket and pork belly comingles with the fried egg. Along with cheddar
cheese, hollandaise, BBQ sauce, mayo, and hot sauce, to say it’s a flavour
explosion is not an exaggeration. But it’s a flavour bomb I love and my
favourite dish of the evening. That gooey egg yolk covering the peppery brisket
and tender pork belly… this is one combo that shouldn’t be missed.
Yet, the winner that stole the judges’ heart was the yuzu
avocado “croast” by Yokai Izakaya. There’s a lot going on with the dish:
starting with a croissant at the base, which is covered with a poached egg,
smoked salmon, salad greed, pickled onion, and whipped ricotta. The egg mixes
with the yuzu avocado crema and mentaiko vinaigrette becoming a dressing that
glues everything together. It’s inventive and different, even from a Japanese
perspective.
Fattoush Sandwich Club’s falafel Scotch egg was beautiful
to behold. And while a runnier egg would work better against the drier falafel,
I loved their take on the traditional pub dish that makes it vegetarian and
less gluttonous. Hopefully, the dish will make a come-back in the Spring as it
would work so well for an Easter brunch.
It wouldn’t be a meal without dessert. Midnight Cookie
created the creme brûlée cookie featuring a soft and chewy brown sugar
cookie topped with a torched pastry crème. While it could have been too rich,
the cookie wasn’t overly sugary so that it helped balance off the sweetness of
the brûléed custard. I saw my fair share of people skipping the savoury to
start with this enticing sweet.
Dine with Eggs is a huge event to showcase Burnbrae Farm’s
eggs, a multi-generation Canadian company that supplies about a third of
the eggs that consumers buy in stores. You’ll also be eating for a good cause
as a portion of each dish sold is donated to Holland Bloorview Kids
Rehabilitation Hospital.
At the launch, Canada’s paralympic Dominic Cozzolino noted
how much Holland Bloorview helped get him through the hurdles he experienced
after getting into an accident and severing his spinal cord. The hospital
supports over 8,500 children annually with different disabilities but prides
itself for creating a supportive stigma-free environment. In fact, Dominic reminisced
about the familial feel of the hospital, not the same memories other hospitals
may elicit.
Still, something about eggs reminds us about loved ones –
scrambled eggs with all the fixings over breakfast or that beautiful molten egg
yolk that provokes an “ooh” as it’s broken. It’s certainly a main ingredient
around my dinner table since I aim to be vegetarian during the week. A
crustless quiche, fried egg on a hash, egg tacos, or a toad-in-a-hole tomato
sandwich frequently make appearances.
Dine with Eggs is a great time to remember this humble but
important ingredient. A cornerstone of many meals and diets across the country.
Let’s get cracking.
Is That It? I Want More!
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