Apr 16thOeufs Cocotte à la Jacques Pepin

When we were in St. Martin (post/write up pending but four months late), we had the most amazing meal of oeufs en cocotte.  We were at a restaurant on the French side of the island, and nothing particularly stuck out to me on the menu.  I had several great meals of fish that trip, but I was feeling something different that evening.  When I saw the egg dish, I thought of Ian Fleming, and his propensity for egg dishes while abroad.  I’d not heard of Oeufs en cocotte, but ordered them anyway.  Its hard to explain how two runny eggs with some cream, cognac, mushrooms, and seasoning could be so delicious, so I’ll try to let my videos and pictures do the talking.  My sister recently got me four cocttes for my birthday and I watched a few videos of Maître d’Oeufs Jacques Pepin making Oeufs Cocotte.  Here is the first link, which I mostly closely followed.  The second video is provided below.

I made the recipe my own, as one does.  I used two eggs per cocotte as I prefer American portions.  I also used some herbs de provence and garnished with parley.  I may have made a mistake or two…  I had my water too high and it boiled over and slightly poached the eggs.  I just poured out the excess water at the end.  I also took too long getting my kitchen torch to light so my cognac never lit, but that just made the finished product have even more of a rich brandy flavor.  Jacques would probably not be impressed, but its hard to mess up this dish.

This video provides further insight: