Try a New Recipe: Eggs Benedict

For our first side Challenge we were challenged to try a new recipe.  That is not hard for me.  The only thing that gave me some direction was that I won't be doing any groceries for the next week or two.  I'm trying to limit how often I go into stores during the lock down to only getting essentials and planning my grocery list to keep me stocked for two to three weeks.  Considering my pantry, fridge and freezer are all well stocked that shouldn't be a problem.  There are a number of recipes I have saved that I have been wanting to try but I don't have some of the essential ingredients.  There are lots of recipes that I can make with ingredients I have on hand.

Here's my first attempt at something new:  Eggs Benedict.

For the past three weeks I have been meaning to make Eggs Benedict.  The first challenge was to make the English Muffins.  Since I don't have a griddle, I had to fry them in a cast iron frying pan one by one, which was kind of tedious, and there was flour build up in the pan which over time caused the pan to smoke a little and the English muffins to get darker as I went on.  Here is the recipe for the English muffins:  https://www.bakedbyanintrovert.com/whole-wheat-english-muffins/.

Then I still had to make the Hollandaise sauce.  I used this recipe: https://tastesbetterfromscratch.com/eggs-benedict-with-homemade-hollandaise-sauce/.  I only made a quarter of the recipe because I only needed one serving and mixed it in a cereal bowl over my smallest pan with some water as a double boiler.  I think I kept it over the heat a little long and it got a little thicker than it should have been which in hindsight could have been easy remedied with a little bit of white wine.

I toasted the English muffin halves, added a thin slice of ham, topped each half with half an egg (I wasn't looking for a huge breakfast) and topped it with Hollandaise sauce and had some stir fried veggies on the side.  Hollandaise sauce may not be the healthiest, but the serving isn't huge either.  Altogether with whole wheat and veggies on the side it was a great breakfast.  It was delicious and I may have to add it to my weekend breakfast repertoire.  I try to do something special for breakfast once on the weekend, keeping things quick and easy during the week.  (I do have another 7 English muffins tucked away in the freezer.)