Meet the farmers - Jacqui and Jim Steele, Egganic

Jacqui and Jim Steele believe that happy chooks lay the best eggs, and the Isa Browns behind their business Egganic are living, laying proof of this.

From their 16-hectare farm at Forest Reefs in Central Western NSW, the Steele's run about 2500 truly free-range chooks. They lay and roost in custom-made mobile chook sheds and roam and scratch freely, just like chooks should. And all of this takes place under the watchful eyes of the Steele's Maremma guard dogs.




At the moment, team Egganic is laying about an egg a day each, so the Steele's are kept  busy collecting, grading and packing thousands of eggs every week. Then on thursdays they load the truck, leave the farm under the care of a regular helper and head off to fill orders around the Central West and Sydney before setting up for a weekend farmers markets in the city.



Jacqui and Jim were one of the first stallholders at Eveleigh markets in 2009. Because it's a weekly market, they were able to build a loyal and supportive network of customers who would come back every week for these beautiful eggs. And if you've ever had the good fortune to try one of Alex Herbert's Bird Cow Fish Croque Madame's at Eveleigh, you'll know that a big part of their goodness comes from those beautiful yellow-yoked Egganic eggs!

Egganic eggs can be found at restaurants and markets across Sydney and a number of outlets in Orange, here's a full list.

Recipes

Being way too fond of custards, curds and the like - I can always find plenty of good uses for egg yolks in this house. But it's the whites that sometimes find themselves loitering in the fridge.

And while I'm sure they are very good for you, the idea of an egg white omelette doesn't really float my boat, so instead I turn to more indulgent options such as these dense, chewy, delicious macaroons (not to be confused with their slightly more trendy counterparts macarons).

Of course meringues and pavlovas are also obvious and good ways to use up extra egg whites and there are plenty more ideas in this vein over here on David Lebovitz' s excellent blog and you could also try these Italian almond biscuits.

But back to my macaroons...This is a great recipe to make with kids as all that's needed is a little stirring and scooping. Plus, they keep nicely for up to a week.

Coconut and apricot jam macaroons

This recipe is very closely based on one found in the excellent book Leon, Baking & Puddings. It makes about 24 biscuits.

6 egg whites
1 cup caster sugar
a pinch of salt
4 tbsp honey
2 cups dessicated coconut
1 tsp vanilla paste
Apricot jam

Heat oven to 150C and line two baking trays with paper. Combine egg whites, sugar, salt, honey and coconut in a large pan on medium. Cook, stirring constantly until the mixture has dissolved into itself, dries out a bit and just begins to turn brown on the bottom.

Remove from heat, stir in the vanilla and let mixture cool completely. Scoop out into golf-ball sized balls on the baking trays. Press down in the middle of each one to make a little indent, fill this with apricot jam then bake for 15 minutes or until the macaroons are golden.

Jacqui's frittata

The morning I visited Egganic, Jacqui, she'd just pulled this number (pictured above) out of the oven for her and Jim to enjoy for lunch. It looked and smelled just amazing. Serves 6.

8 free range eggs
2 tbsp cream
2 cups vegetables (in this case, cooked sweet potato cubes, sliced zucchini and fresh cherry tomatoes)
1/4 cup dill leaves, finely chopped
1/4 cup parmesan cheese, finely grated

Preheat oven to 180C and lightly grease an oven-proof dish. Whisk together the eggs and cream and season to taste. Pour into the prepared dish, add the vegetables and herbs and scatter with the parmesan. Bake for 20 minutes or until cooked to your liking. Serve with crusty bread and a salad.

 

Baked bacon, egg and pesto 

Bacon and egg rolls must be one of the most popular breakfast items ever. At every farmers market we do, the queue for said rolls is always far longer than any other and for good reason; there's nothing quite like the combination of soft eggs with quivering golden yolks and crunchy salty bacon. But there's also nothing quite like the mess that can arise in your kitchen when making them in any quantity at home.

Enter the baked bacon and egg roll. And while I know this is no new creation, it's so good and so easy, I thought it wouldn't hurt to share again here. Just whack the oven on, line a muffin tin with bacon or pancetta, break an egg into each, season and add any other flavourings you like then bake until done. Stuff in a roll, on toast or eat plain with a roasted tomato or two. My kids also like these in their school lunchboxes. Perfect, mess free and delicious.

For 12

12 slices bacon or pancetta
12 beautiful free range eggs
Salt and pepper
12 tbsp pesto

Preheat oven to 180C and line a 12-hole, one cup capacity muffin tin with the bacon or pancetta. Crack an egg into each, season well and spoon in the pesto.

Bake for 15 minutes or until the egg is cooked to your liking then serve with a soft roll, toasted sourdough or a breakfast-y salad of rocket and roast tomato.

Happy campers and a spring quiche

Todd and Sara Fergusson's chickens live in caravans on one big paddock just out of Dunedoo in western NSW. They are protected by Maremma sheep dogs, graze native pastures all day, lay beautiful eggs and are part of a clever rotational farming system that you can read about over here on One Farm Day.

But in the meantime, having just returned from a visit to Todd's farm with two cartons of said eggs, we are making things like quiche and cakes this week. And it was the former for lunch today, which, despite my wonky pastry, turned out to be pretty darn eggselent.

Spring quiche

With key ingredients like lots of eggs, cream. bacon and butter, I'm not saying this is the healthiest thing you'll eat all year but it will be one of the best. The peas and mustard cress add both colour and lift in terms of flavour but you could leave them out or swap with some caramelised onion and/or thyme leaves. The below pastry recipe will make enough for two tarts so perhaps you might divide it into two discs, wrap both in plastic and stash one in the freezer. Let it defrost overnight in the fridge before using. Or you could roll it out and line the pastry tin and freeze that, then you can blind bake from frozen.

For the pastry

400g plain flour
1 tsp salt
200g butter, diced
1/3 cup iced water 1 tsp salt

Measure out the flour and salt into a large bowl. Add the diced butter and place in the freezer for half an hour. Then tip the lot into the bowl of a food processor, add the iced water and pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Turn this out to a lightly floured bench and bring together with the heel of both hands until you have a smooth dough. Shape into a large, flat disc, wrap with plastic and place in the fridge for half an hour.

Preheat the oven to 180C. Remove pastry from the fridge, re-dust your work surface with flour and roll out the pastry until you have a nice thin round. Grab a loose-bottomed tart tin (mine is 24cm in diameter) and gently drape this over your rolling pin and then unroll into the tin. Press into the fluted corners and gently roll the pin over the top of the tin to trim the pastry edges nice and neatly. return  to the fridge for another half an hour.

To blind bake the pastry shell, line it with baking paper and then tip in lots of rice, dried pulses or any spare change you have lying around the house. You want the pastry weights to almost fill the tin so the sides are supported while cooking. Place in the oven for 10 minutes or until the base and sides are just beginning to turn golden. Remove the coins and baking paper and return to the oven for a further 5 minutes or until the base is just beginning to turn golden. Set aside while making the filling.

For the filling

5 rashers bacon (we use Trunkey Creek)
1 1/2 cups cream
3 eggs and 4 yolks
Salt and pepper to taste
1 cup fresh peas, blanched
1/2 cup red mustard cress (ours came from Darling Mills)

Cook the bacon in full rashers until golden on each side, remove from heat and cut into small pieces. Whisk together the cream and eggs and season to taste. Scatter the base of the pastry shell with the bacon, pour over the cream mixture and then dot this with the peas. Place in the oven for about 25 minutes or until the quiche is golden brown on top and feels just firm on top. Remove from heat, scatter with the cress and serve.

Todd's Farmer Brown's eggs can be found in Sydney via Accoutrement, Feather and Bone and The Village Grocer in Balgowlah. They can be found in select grocery stores across the Blue Mountains, at the Mudgee Farmers Markets, S&S Meats Mudgee the Mudgee Corner Store and their home town  butcher shop; S&S Meats Dunedoo. For any other information about sourcing Farmer Brown's eggs, drop Todd a line via the website.

Who let the dogs out?

Yesterday, Alice, her friend Milly and I, visited the Good family's trufferie near Millthorpe. It was the first day of their truffle season, and I think speak for all three of us when I say it was the coldest we have ever been.

Wind blew sheets of drizzle in every direction and the temperature was a numbing two degrees but, it was to the girls' credit that they joined us on the hunt without (much) complaint. It might have been the hot chocolates Loretto made us drink in their cosy cottage before we set out and/or the excitement of what was to come, but either way, the cold became bearable as soon as the hunt began. We ran behind the dogs, sniffing the dirt they scratched up and helping Greg mark the spot with paddle pop sticks which would alert Loretto and her mother to a possible find.

As their name suggests, the Good's are really good people. Generous and switched on, they produce up to 10kgs of truffles every July from their 2000 trees.

Most of these go to Sydney restaurants while Orange locals can source them by request from Slice of Orange. We were very lucky to take the day's first truffle home, and on Loretto's suggestion I put it straight into a jar of eggs and then stored these in the fridge. The truffle will infuse the eggs with it's aroma and in a day or two provide us with a beautifully scented omelette. The Good's also suggested I keep it very simple when matching my truffle to food. Shaved over creamy mashed potato is Greg's favourite while Loretto likes hers over scrambled eggs.

We are to have ours for supper tonight shaved into salted, softened butter then spread on toast fingers and dipped into eggs. The leftover truffle butter has been wrapped up in baking paper and will be given to a friend.

Truffle butter soldiers with boiled eggs

40g salted butter, softened (the nicest you can get)
1/2 a fresh black truffle (about the size of a marble)
A loaf of beautiful white bread
eggs, one per person

Boil eggs for five minutes each (or to your liking). Meanwhile, slice bread into thick pieces and toast until golden. Using a microplane grater or similar, grate the truffle into the softened butter and very gently mix together. Spread the butter on hot toast fingers and eat immediately. Oh yum.