My new favorite egg salad: Egg Tartare

Egg Tartare
River Cottage Every Day Copyright 2009

6 medium eggs, at room temperature
4 spring onions or 2 small shallots, finely chopped (I used green onions)
3-4 gherkins,finely diced
1 tbsp capers, rinsed
2 tbsp finely chopped parsley (I left this out)
1 tbsp finely chopped dill (optional) (I used a generous sprinkling of dried dill)
2-3 tbsp mayonnaise
Dab of Dijon mustard
2-3 dashes of Tabasco sauce (optional)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Slices of wholemeal, sourdough, rye or your favourite bread, to serve (I only had Fiber One Honey Wheat bread on hand)

1. First, boil the eggs. (The author discusses how to cook the eggs and suggests the egg yolks should be soft but I just hard boiled them.)

2. Peel the eggs.  Roughly chop the eggs and mix with the spring onions or shallots, gherkins, capers, parsley and dill, if using. In a small bowl, whisk together the mayonnaise, mustard and Tabasco, if using.

3. Gently combine this mixture with the eggs and season with salt and pepper. Serve on wholemeal, sourdough or rye bread, as closed or open sandwiches.
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I've always loved egg salad but no egg salad has ever impressed me as much as this one. I just happen to love green onions, capers and dill. The gherkins add a nice punch. You don't need very much mayo for this - the second time I made it I cut back on the mayo and punched up the Dijon mustard (I made a half-batch to start but it was so good I soon found myself making another half-batch). If you used eggs with a soft yolk as the author suggests, the salad would probably require even less dressing.

Green onions have become the staple onion in my produce bin. Sweet onions had been my staple onion forever but I think I've only purchased two of them since I've moved in August. I particularly like green onions for use in salads. 

This recipe is so named because it uses the classic ingredients in tartare (tartar) sauce.  I love tartar sauce sauce so it's no wonder I love this.  Tartar sauce often has tarragon so you could add that or switch out the dill for tarragon

I checked this cookbook out of the library.  It's a bit out of my league  - not in complexity but this is more for the crowd who buy organic, eat locally, eat seasonally, grind there own wheat, etc, while I am lucky to get food on the table at all these days.  However, I have my eye on many recipes in this cookbook.

I baked for a bake sale this week.  South Seas Cookies, 7 Up Cake, and Peppermint Patties  are my standards.  I should have taken a new picture of the South Seas Cookies!  They came out really nice.  I also made Sweet and Crunch popcorn (in pink), chocolate covered pretzel rods (chocolate with white chocolate drizzle and white chocolate with assorted sprinkles and jimmies) and boxed brownies that I melted and spread a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips on top after they came out of the oven (they were studier to package that way).  Everything sold well. People seemed a bit afraid of the pink popcorn. I used to eat pink popcorn at the zoo when I was a kid but maybe not everyone had that experience. But at least one woman who bought it soon came back for more. It's one of Nick's favorites.  Heidi's got some great recipes.

Question of the Day:  Do you like eggs?  Eggs seem to be one of those foods that many people dislike.