Eggs à la jardinière (egg and Béchamel bake)

Another great egg dish from Louisbourg! Modified from the original in From the Hearth, this is a relatively simple dish that tastes outstanding. Basically, you take onions, Béchamel sauce and beaten eggs, mix them all together and bake it up.

This recipe is more effort than eggs à la bourgeoise, but still completely reasonable for a weeknight dinner along with a nice salad.

The original recipe suggests this dish serves 10-12 people, but if it’s your main dish expect it to serve 4-5.

Ingredients

4-5 onions (mild flavoured varieties), cut in thin strips
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
2 cups milk
10 eggs, well beaten
salt and pepper to taste

Milder or sweeter onions, like Spanish, Walla Walla, or Vidalia, are best for this dish because it contains a LOT of onion. If you only have the standard cooking onions, you can make them less pungent by blanching them after cutting them up.

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350F. 

Melt butter in an oven-proof frying pan or French oven and sauté onion strips until translucent. 

Add flour to the butter and onions and cook briefly. Add 1/2 cup of milk and mix well to work out any lumps of flour. Add the rest of the milk and simmer until Béchamel sauce is thickened, stirring continually. Add salt and pepper. Remove from heat. 

Mix beaten raw eggs into pan with Béchamel and onions. Bake in oven at 350F for 20-30 minutes, or until eggs are done. 

It was pretty easy to make this recipe all in one oven-safe pan or pot. It’s a little bit of work to get the Béchamel smooth with big strips of onions in there – you could put that together in a separate sauce pan, but then you lose that one pot advantage. Otherwise this is pretty straightforward.

The Verdict

I really enjoyed this dish! It has the texture of a frittata, but tastes like Béchamel as well as eggs. And the onions, despite their prevalence, were not too strong. They give a really nice texture to the dish.

Definitely one to make again!