Thursday, January 29, 2009

Eggs-Cellent


Lucy has had a long and tumultuous relationship with eggs.

She used to eat them hard boiled, then not at all. Then she ate them hard boiled but just the whites. Then she liked them scrambled with a little goat cheese and chives. Then, and for a long stretch, not at all again. Then, she watched her father eat them poached and she embraced the egg again but still no yoke, only white and she kind of ate around the outside.



She even entertained eating them poached in tomato sauce. She was game, but never got comfortable with the whole "eggs in the stuff my pasta should be in" idea and anyway, she was having a whole love/hate thing with sauce in general then and whether sauce should actually be on stuff or just thrown in the garbage bin, so that never really went anywhere.

And now we are in an egg fried gently in butter, no yoke if we are home, and over medium if we are in a restaurant, so she can easily separate the yolk from the egg and hand it to me to dispose of across the table.

So, well into the fried egg no yolk phase, Lucy has been enamored of my separating the yolk from the white and she has been eager to do it. She is pretty adept at cracking eggs and landing the whole thing inside a bowl or pan, but she still is missing the nuances of toggling a runny yolk back and forth between shells and separating the two.

But last night, we went for it.

I handed her an egg and said "Okay, first thing we're gonna do is crack the shell open against something hard."

And then I set about melting a nice pad of butter in a pan. I'm not sure why I wasn't watching Lucy with the egg. I should have been because "crack the shell open against something hard" in pre-school language actually meant "here, take this egg and smash it against your sister's head over and over until you crack the entire thing open in her hair".

Fortunately, Edie found this all strangely humorous and most of the egg - except for what was matted into her hair and the yolk which Lucy and I ultimately fished out of the pan with a spoon after a failed toggle - actually ended up in the pan.

Our long tumultuous road with the egg continues...

xxYM

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12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fantastic photo!

Unknown said...

I love reading about your girls. I am having another in June(girl)-my first will be 2 and 4mnts(boy) then-so I can not wait for the fun they will have together. Hopefully the sharing of the boob will not be to tramtic as he seems to be as attached as Edie is.

And now I want a poached egg.

xoch said...

Agree with lorelei, awesome pic! Love how all the yolks are such a bright, sunny and yummy yellow.

And now I want an egg for lunch.

Anonymous said...

It is a fantastic photo! I totally wish I took it, but I didn't.

I took the photo off the internet because I just couldn't resist it's beauty, but there was no photographer's name and I couldn't find any hint of the identity or it's origin.

Of course, I did this research at 4:30am and hopped up on cold medicine, but I tried. If the real photographer sees this and sends me an e-mail, I will not only give them credit, I'll sing their praises...

This is, like, the best egg picture I've ever seen. If I were a real photographer, I'd take pictures exactly like this one.

Kim

Le laquet said...

My youngest nephew likes the noise they make as they hit the tiled floor - just dropped, not thrown. His mum has found him there with a dozen cracked eggs and an empty book before now.

Le laquet said...

Duh - box not book!!

Anne Stesney said...

Lucy and I had similar palettes at similar ages. I would only eat fried egg whites for the longest time. And I didn't like sauce nor cheese for a while. I'm happy to say I love both.

Was Edie's hair all shiny and soft after her spa treatment?

Anonymous said...

Now tell me what happens if a little ity bitty microscopic have to use a magnifying glass to see piece of yolk is left on the white part when you give it to Lucy. Oh wait, you don't have to tell me, I currently live with a 4 year old.
As always, I love your posts!
Lisa

Anonymous said...

I am raising laying hens in Culebra and also am in awe of the egg photo. That yolk color can only be from fresh laid eggs.

Oh yea, love the blog and your writing too!

William

Anonymous said...

Lisa -

Yeah, she actually asks me EVERY time whether I took out the yoke - as if I forget these things - and that's why I'm teaching her to do it herself...so the white hot 4 year old scrutiny will finally end.

Hey William from Culebra -

So glad to have you join us from that gorgeous paradise of yours! And that you are raising hens just makes me seriously jealous - oh to go out to the coop to pick out my eggs instead of the grocery store!

Kim

Christine said...

I had an egg aversion when I was about Lucy's age, but it came and went. However, I loved cheese, but had a deep fear of tomato sauce for about a year...it will all work out in time.

Anonymous said...

Oh, this sounds too familiar. My now 3 year old loved mashed egg yolks with milk when he was tiny (like 8 months), then detested anything to do with eggs. Then he ate them poached for like a week. And then he detested them again until about two months ago when I discovered that he was eating them at the in-laws!! Turns out now he likes "no-poop" eggs that have been turned into omelets. But heaven forbid they should be scrambled!