Dirty Snack - Hard Fried Eggs

Growing up in southwest Ohio, just across the river from Kentucky, I never knew about over-easy eggs. My mom, who was a southern cook by assimilation, always hard fried eggs in a cast iron skillet. She used bacon drippings, which she kept for days in a can on the back of the stove. I don’t know what kept us from dying from food poisoning, but eventually she switched to Crisco shortening. She fried eggs until the edges browned and curled up and the whites and yolks were solid and rubbery. Today, I use a Paula Deen non-stick sauté pan and can fry eggs without turning them to rubber. Even so, I can’t stand runny whites and can barely tolerate soft yolks.

Occasionally, my mother would make eggs for lunch or dinner (supper, as we called it then), in the same manner as she made them for breakfast, but they would become a sandwich spread with mustard. It was my favorite lunch and I still like a hard-fried egg sandwich.

My mom always fried bacon, or ham, or sausage to go with eggs for breakfast. There was always toast with real butter. And, coffee, strong enough to grow hair on your chest. We didn’t realize it, but she started me out drinking a quasi-café au lait—half coffee, half Wilson’s condensed milk from a can, and a heaping teaspoon of sugar. I have cut back on the cream and sweeten with a sugar substitute now, but my coffee still has to be deadly strong.

Sometimes, she would switch it up and make pancakes for breakfast, which would also be rubbery and solid with crispy edges. She also made buttermilk biscuits drowned in white gravy with sausage bits. I don’t even try to make pancakes and on the rare occasions I make biscuits, it’s by cracking open a can of them.

Here’s my dirty snack recipe for two hard fried egg sandwiches, updated somewhat from the kind my mother made.

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1 tbsp. sour cream

½ cup shredded pepper jack cheese

4 slices of any kind of bread, toasted

Preparation:

Heat a teaspoon of butter in a sauté pan over medium heat. Lightly beat the eggs with the sour cream. Pour the egg mixture into heated pan. Cook until the eggs start to set. Sprinkle the pepper jack over the eggs. Continue to cook until the cheese melts and the eggs are very firm. Season with salt and pepper. Spread butter on the toast if desired. Assemble the sandwiches using half the egg and cheese mixture on each.

This egg and cheese mixture can also be served in a warmed flour tortilla, topped with salsa. (Nope, my mom never heard of tortillas or salsa or sour cream…)