Romantic Sunday Brunch

Sometimes, actually quite often, on Sunday morning we want to enjoy a homemade breakfast or brunch. My husband loves Eggs Benedict and especially Eggs Royale, and those particular dishes are very common in our table. This Sunday, I wanted to try something else, but something from eggs. I think the Eggs are crucial part of the breakfast or brunch. We end up to cook Eggs Cocotte, a classic French dish. I served it with a homemade sourdough bread which I made in the same morning, since nothing beats the oven-fresh bread.

For the dessert I prepared French toast from Finnish pulla with Rosemary Bilberry sauce. Wow, what a dish! I almost started to cry, it was so damn delicious!

For drinks, my Hubby made smoothie using fresh mango, blood grapefruit and mint leaves. Since the mango wasn’t ripe enough to be very sweet, he added a teaspoon of maple syrup. It made huge difference. The other thing which always make a difference for the brunch, is champagne. For us, champagne is must, as my motto says... No champagne, no brunch ;)

Sunday Brunch Menu

Eggs Cocotte,  Rye sourdough bread

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French toast and Rosemary Bilberry sauce, 

fresh blueberries

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Mango, Blood grapefruit & Mint Smoothie

Dom Pérignon Champagne Brut 2006

Coffee 

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The recipes for the dishes you can find from the links below:
 

Eggs Cocotte, Rye Sourdough bread

 
French toast & Rosemary Bilberry sauce

 

Mango Mint smoothie

Eggs Cocotte

Brunch needs one egg dish, and our favourite is Eggs Benedict or Eggs Royale, but this recipe is something different. Fos last Sunday's brunch I made Eggs Cocotte, or Ouefs Cocotte in originally, for a change. This is easy but almost as good as Benedicts. Just put all ingredients in to a ramekins and cook. That's all you need to do.

This is more healthy dish than Benedicts since there is no butter involved, just cream is used. But many qualitites which I like in Benedicts, is still in this dish. Eggs with runny yolks, ham and spinach. As an extra, salty cheese gives a nice addition to this dish kind of replacing the feeling of Hollandaise sauce.

Size of this dish is quite small, so if you hungry or do not have anything else with this, I recommend to double the recipe.

Eggs Cocotte
For 2 person
2 large eggs
0,5 dl spinach (cooked/sauteed and cooled)
2-4 slices of prosciutto
30 g brie (or feta or chevre)
2 tbsp cream
Black pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 180 C.
Divide spinach, prosciutto and cheese among ramekins, season with black pepper. Crack in an egg and add a half of the cream to each ramekin.

Place bowls in a baking dish, and pour hot water into baking dish until it is halfway up the sides of the bowl. Transfer baking dish to oven, being careful not to let the water splash into the bowls. Bake for 10-15 minutes or until whites are set and the yolk is still soft.

Serve with slice of good quality bread.

French toast with Rosemary Blueberry sauce

Bilberry is THE best berry which grows in Finland, to my mind. It is a real superfood. This time I used it as a sauce for my brunch dessert, French toast. I added some rosemary to the sauce, to give the nice earthiness flavor and some lemon zest to give a twist. The combination really worked.

As I mentioned that bilberry is superfood, I think that also French toast is superfood :D Maybe not in a similar way, but it is super good to my soul... And when I make it using Finnish pulla, it is even better.

Many of the french toast recipes contain cinnamon and sugar, but with pulla, sugar does not need to be added since the pulla is already sweet pastry. And instead of cinnamon, I prefer cardamom which, as well, is ingredient of the pulla.

French toast
For 2 person
4 slice of day old Finnish pulla or french bread (about 2-3 cm thick slices)
1 large egg
2 dl milk
butter for cooking

Beat and milk together in a bowl. Place the bread in the bowl and let the bread soak up the egg on one side for about 1 minute, then turn and let soak on other side. Let any excess egg mixture drip off into bowl. Heat frying pan or griddle.

Melt a small amount of butter in pan. Place french toast pieces in pan and fry until golden on first side. Flip and cook other side until golden and crispy.

Rosemary Blueberry sauce
100 g bilberries (or blueberries)
50 g sugar
1 sprig of rosemary
1/4 lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice

Combine blueberries, rosemary, sugar and water in a saucepan, bring it to boil. Cook approx. 10 minutes, until sauce has thickened some amount. Cool. Season with lemon juice and zest of lemon.

Mango Mint Smoothie

I don't fancy pure juices, not even it is so trendy nowadays. They are just not enough for me. And my tummy gets ill. The worst for my tummy is orange juice. But I like smoothies, and fruities.

This drink, is my favourite for lazy Sunday brunch, maybe because I love mango, and I love herbs. Combining them, can’t go wrong… Quite many herbs goes nice with mango. Or what you think? To get some acidity to the drink, I have used orange or lemon, and now I tried blood grapefruit. All of them are good, but the amount needs to be considered. Don’t put lemon as much as more sweet orange. But is this smoothie?

I call is a smoothie, but maybe it really is fruitie, since there are no milk products used. For me, name is not the important one, and you can call it either you want. But, do enjoy the taste!don't fancy pure juice, not even it is so trendy nowadays.

Mango Mint Smoothie
for 2 person
1 ripe mango
1 blood grapefruit
15-20 mint leaves
1 tsp maple syrap (optional)
1,5-2 dl ice

Add all ingredients to the blender. Blend well. Garnish with some mint and serve right away.