Mmmmm, mmmmm, goooooood!

This morning was a treat, of sorts. I threw caution to the wind, and began heating the pan. It was already used for something fatty and nice sometime last week — and has been sitting there ever since. I thought the BIL’s girlfriend was just being lazy and didn’t wash it — only to later reason that she probably left it there to solidify because it could still be used for something else later, and so she left it (or so I’m telling myself this is the case). Sorry, no pic of the solidified lard. But… I do have a picture of her preparation — eggs and chunks of lard! Mmmmm, mmmmm, gooooodness I tell you. The salted fat (lard) was cut into smaller chunks (top of cutting board) from the solid fatty mass (one chunk is on the board, and two more are in the pink bag).

The second picture shows the final product. I forgot to mention that the lard and eggs was hardly enough for BIL; she had to add slices of sausage (Колбаса) to give some hearty, meaty flavor. What is kinda gross to me is that you can see the fried pieces of lard still in the egg. Man did BIL like that. I wish I had a picture of him chowing it down… you would have been laughing. He acted like he was like a famished canine after a long winter without food. Incidentally, you can see the edge of the pan they used in the second picture.

This unique pan has a depression at the bottom center. I don’t know why, or even if it were by direct design (though I’m supposing it had to be unless someone intentionally bent it into its current shape), but it functions like a hybrid pan/wok (pok or wan). Thus, residual cooking material concentrates (pools) in the center of the pan after use. Of course, our stove is far from level, so it pooled a bit off to the side. In any case, the lard (сало) had turned opaque and settled into a ~5″ round dollop in our trusty, well-used aluminium frypan.

To continue, the pan heated nicely until just a bit of smoke (from remaining bits of lard chunks and/or sausage) was emanating from its surface. I whipped up the eggs with a bit of milk (молоко), salt and pepper, and dropped them straight onto the melted cholesterol-rich, saturated-fatty goodness. Incidentally, you can see in the 3rd picture — how diverse our food experiences can be. Three eggs, pulled from the refrigerator at the same time, each with a distinctive coloration. I’ve certainly never seen this before, so I had to take a picture. Perhaps one of them froze? Or maybe they were eggs from three different farms where the chickens received vastly different sources of food? If anyone knows what’s going on here, I’d love to read the feedback.

Why? What gives such coloration to the eggs (yolks)? The “yellow” one seems normal to me… so what’s with the orange and white yolks?

I cooked the eggs over medium while lifting the edges every 15 seconds, allowing fresh scramble to sneak under the would-be omelet, to begin hte base anew. This technique, as conveyed to me by my brother, the Chef, produces nice, fluffy, delicious eggs (especially if you have whipped and aerated the eggs with a spot or two of milk).

I don’t have a picture of today’s omelet, but here is one that gives you a pretty good idea of what we enjoyed this morning. That’s right… this is a different picture. So what? So I like taking pictures of food — and yes, this was an archive of omelet pictures — got a problem with that?

Cheers to all the egg-lovers in the world!

May chickens lay in your neck of the woods…