Blarney Blow Out Weekend. I need some Scotch Eggs advice.

[MsBees]

Next weekend we are hosting my sons friends. They all graduated from college last year and over the years they have spent a lot of time here. Everyone will be arriving next friday night and leaving sunday morning.There will be a total of 20 people sleeping at our home and we will have 24 people for multiple meals.

I have alot of the menu planned but still need to tweak it here and there. LOL...So I will be back to ask opinions.

For now I'm thinking about saturday morning breakfast, which is the official day of Blarney Blow Out when the lot of them will visit the bars in town. I was thinking of serving assorted scones, fruit, yogurt and for the protein I thought scotch eggs seemed irish pub like. I have two fryers and could fry 2 dozen eggs if I had to. But I'm trying to figure a way around that. Or at least figuring out if I can do anything ahead of time. Could I cook the eggs the day ahead, assemble them and then fry them the next morning? Even better could I assemble them a day ahead and then bake them? Has anyone here ever baked them? How where they?

Your advice will be greatly appreciated.

[Breadcrumbs]

MsBees, I baked Scotch eggs for our Super Bowl get-together and they turned out great. I posted about them in the WFD thread at the time.

Here's the link to that post if you're interested:
http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/889203#7882302

I used a recipe by Jill Dupleix that you can find here:

http://aww.ninemsn.com/food/cookbooks...

I even froze the leftovers then re-heated them and they turned out perfectly. I hope this is of some help.

[coll]

Just to be different: How about green eggs and ham? Although your idea sounds better, I'm just getting lazy in my old age. Personally, I'd serve with Irish coffee, but you know your audience.

[MsBees]

LOL...to be honest I love that idea. I live near the Dr Seuss museum :).

How does someone go about making green eggs and Ham.

Oh wait, LOL....I'm not sure how that would work out before Blarney Blow Out :)

[coll]

I've never made, but I read here that if you add grape jelly to the scrambled eggs they turn green.

Wow a Dr Seuss museum, is that in La Jolla? Just read a book which featured all his works going back to when he was a advertising illustrator. Guess that's why green eggs and ham was on my mind.

[MsBees]

Ummm ....I can't even imagine what grape jelly in eggs would taste like. So think I would go the food coloring route before adding grape jelly. Its funny because I am making scrambled eggs for brunch the Sunday everyone is here. But after seeing green scrambled eggs I think I would need to run this one by my son.

Im in Massachusetts. And oddly enough today is Dr Seuss's birthday.

[coll]

So many coincidences, what does it all mean ;-)

I think the grape jelly was because the eggs are yellow, so you have to get something more blue to make them green?

[hotoynoodle]

am sorry, but the thought of green eggs makes me a bit queasy. how about some basil chiffonade and call it a day? :)

[MsBees]

If the thought makes you queasy google scrambled green eggs. ::::shiver::::

I was thinking of adding some herbs to the eggs on sunday morning anyway and there will be ham in the potato pie. LOL...I think that is close as we will get :)

[hotoynoodle]

you can definitely prep them ahead and also cook them ahead and just reheat. it's a sturdy dish. i generally bake them instead of deep-frying since the latter is so messy.

[MsBees]

Thank you very much.

I've seen a number of recipes for the baked variety. Is there one in particular you use?

[hotoynoodle]

no recipe. i use the bulk jones breakfast sausage, which has no sugar or fillers. i cut it in rounds and smoosh each round fairly flat. spread with some dijon mustard and roll around a hard-cooked egg. i use slightly undercooked eggs too. bake til brown. i don't usually eat wheat, so no coating on mine and nobody seems to mind. these also make great deviled eggs.

but peeling that many quail eggs would make me nutz!

[MsBees]

Sounds delicious.

Yup I figure I would need at least 3 to 4 quail eggs per person. Hahahaha ...it reminds me of a Lucy skit :)

[juster]

I peeled 80 of them two wreks ago, which sounds like about how many you'd be doing. It took about an hour. It helps to press all around them with your fingers to crack the shells (takes very gentle pressure only), then soak them, like Idkelley said. Then when you peel, try to nick the membrane with your fingernail and grab it; lots of the shell will go with it, usually, and it goes pretty fast. I do it in a bowl of water and the shells get rinsed off and sink.

[MsBees]

Only an hour. You work fast, I'm very impressed. Juster, juster....LOL...what are you doing to me :). hahahaha I'm reconsidering whether I can fit it in to my schedule :)

[juster]

Maybe don't. I don't want to be responsible for you being overworked and getting stressed out! *lol* They'll taste the same. (Okay, maybe an hour and a quarter... I didn't time it...) your blowout menu sounds great, btw!

[MsBees]

hahaha...thanks juster :)

I'm going to try to finalize the menu this weekend. But I'm sure you know how that is. Menus seem to be constantly changing for me.

[ldkelley]

A few weeks ago I had a party where I made 60 mini scotch eggs with quail eggs. I fried them in my fryer about 3 days ahead, refrigerated and then day of I put them on a rack on a cookie sheet in a 400 degree oven to get hot and crispy again.

They went fast! Each one ended up the size and (looked deceptively like) a falafel.

[MsBees]

Thank you so much :)

Wow! That's a lot of eggs. Where does one find qual eggs? I think that size would be much better for a crowd. Would you mind sharing your recipe? I've never worked with quail eggs before.

[ldkelley]

I found them at Whole Foods, they were not cheap, $7 per 2 dozen package.

I used a straight pin to poke a hole in the bottom of the quail eggs, boiled for 3 and a half mins and then put them in ice water. (4 mins are fully hard cooked, these are a bit soft, but they will be cooked twice more so I slightly undercooked them.)

I lightly crushed the shells with my muddler and let them sit in the water for a few mins so the shells would loosen.Then I peeled them all (which took forever). I started with 3 1/2 dozen and there were a few bad ones and I destroyed a few but ended up with about 60 good ones.

I used bulk pork and Penzey's Breakfast sausage seasoning with a some extra cayenne and tarragon, but you can use any bulk breakfast sausage here.

You can just grab a lump of sausage, poke a hole in it and wrap the sausage around it. I wanted it fairly even in thickness so I patted a bunch of sausage out on a large board and then rolled it with a rolling pin to about 1/4" thick and cut it with a pizza slicer. It worked perfectly but I am not sure it would be worth doing for 2 dozen.

I then rolled the sausage covered eggs in seasoned bread crumbs (I bought plain and used a little more of the sausage seasoning in it).

I fried them four about 4 mins each after some trial and error. I wanted them to be done but super brown because I knew I was going to re-heat them.

I had some blowouts, where the meal shell separated and you could see the egg. We ate those as testers. :)

I reheated them on a cookie sheet with a wire rack for 20 mins at 350 until they were nice and brown and hot. I used a large deviled egg tray to serve them in a huge pile.

They went over very well.

I've attached a picture of the table so you can see relative size.

Good luck!

[MsBees]

WOWWWW!!!! What a beautiful spread. Great job.

::::sigh:::: I called Whole foods and I can't get them here :(

There is a store where I can get them on Friday. But I'm nervous that may be cutting it too close. My intention was to make the stew for 24 on Thursday and do all the baking on Friday. How long did it take you to make the eggs? It sounds like an all day project.

[juster]

Try an Asian market. Mine has them at $1.35 for a carton of 10, available every day.

(Whoops; this is in reply to MsBees.)

[MsBees]

Thanks juster. I'll check it out.

The only problem is I realized I would have to make a minimum of 72 but probably more. Theses are for kids just a year out of college so some of them are still pretty big eaters. I just cant imagine peeling that many eggs. Especially when I am cooking 4 meals for this group. So I think the quail eggs will have to wait for a smaller group or hors d'oeurvres on another occasion.

[Paprikaboy]

I've seen recipes where you fry the eggs and then finish them off in the oven.
I don't see why you can't fry them the day before and then take them out of the fridge an hour before and cook them in the oven. Here's Heston's recipe.

http://www.channel4.com/4food/recipes/chefs/heston-blumenthal/scotch-eggs-recipe.

I'm a big fan of scotch eggs but would never make my own so impresses if you're making 24.

As for your menu in general have you considered colcannon with your stew?. It's an Irish classic.

Nigel Slater recipe:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyl...

[MsBees]

Thanks for the recipe it sounds delicious.

Unfortunatley I don't think this group would be happy with cabbage in their mashed potatoes :(

[MsBees]

Blarney Blow Out Menu (work in progress)

Everyone brings their own Irish beer

FRIDAY

Cocktail
-Tommy Doyle
Appetizers
-cheeses or a cheddar stout dip-havent decided
Main Course
-Beef Stew made with an irish stout and bacon
-pumpernickel bread (its what we like with it)
-Irish Soda bread (maybe)
-Butter
-big green salad.
Dessert
-havent decided
Late night snack
-havent decided - but this could be dessert

Since everyone arrives at different times I leave the stew on the stove with bowls next to it and everyone serves themselves. The salad, bread and butter is typically left on the dining room table

Saturday

Breakfast
-Fruit and yogurt
-maple oatmeal scones
-savory scone- havent decided what kind
-cranberry, orange scones-maybe
-irish soda bread or scones-maybe
-scotch eggs-if I can figure out how to do it for 24 people
-Tea, coffee, Dooleys liq, juice

Everything is laid out on the dining room table and people help themselves.

Dinner

Cocktail
-havent decided

Appetizers
-Cheeses or a cheddar stout dip-havent decided
Main Course
-baked potato soup with cheese and bacon garnish
-both corned beef and turkey reubens
-bread or cracker- haven't decided
-big green salad
Dessert
-havent decided
Late night snack-haven't decided

Everyone helps themselves to soup in the kitchen. I'm unsure if the soup garnish will be in the kitchen or on the dining room table. But a big platter of sandwiches and the salad will be on dining room table.

Sunday

Brunch
-fruit and yogurt
-scrambled eggs topped with cheese
-potato bacon or ham pie
-bacon
-irish soda bread or toasted english
-butter
-tea, coffee, juice and champagne

Any suggestions?