Quail Scotch Eggs

Lady Gregory once said:

“Our curses on them that boil the eggs too hard! What use is an egg that is hard to any person on earth?”

I have to agree with her; I cannot stand an over-boiled egg! The moment you bite into a blue-boiled egg the struggle begins: the dry, floury yolk not only sticks to the roof of your mouth, but slowly choke you until you desperately reach for a much-needed drink in order to swallow the dreadfulness!

This was my very fear when I decided to make these scotch eggs for our Christmas Eve nibbles. I wanted them small (hence the quail eggs), but runny and delicious. For weeks I’ve researched how to soft-boil quail eggs before I attempted to make these little bites of golden deliciousness.

Ingredients

• 6 Good quality pork sausages, I used a herb flavoured variety
• 12 Quail’s eggs
• 2 Hen’s eggs, beaten
• 4 tablespoons Plain flour
• 200 grams Panko breadcrumbs
• Vegetable oil for deep-frying

Method

1. Before you start, ensure you have the following ready:
   • Bowl with ice water
   • Timer (I used my phone’s timer) set on one minute and 30 seconds
   • Metal Tablespoon
   • Set the oven to 220 degrees Celsius
   • Have two baking trays ready (one to go into the oven and the other to place the raw scotch eggs on before frying.
   • Three bowls: first with flour, next with the beaten egg, last one with the Panko breadcrumbs.
2. In a saucepan, heat some water until it starts to bubble gently (the bubbles shouldn’t break the surface of the water). Place the quail’s eggs on a large slotted spoon and lower them all at once into the gently-boiling water. Let boil for exactly one minute before turning off the heat and leaving the eggs in the water for another 30 seconds. Use the slotted spoon to take the eggs out of the water and plunging them into the bowl with the ice water. After a minute, gently tap each egg with the metal spoon to crack the shell and place back into the water before peeling.
3. Once the eggs are peeled (this will be painstakingly slow as the eggs are incredibly fragile!), place them in the fridge to firm up whilst you prepare the sausage meat.
4. In a mixing bowl, squeeze out the sausages out of their casings. Mix with a fork until combined and divide into twelve equally-sized balls.
5. Take one ball and split into two parts again (two-thirds and one third). Flatten each bit of meat on a board before placing an egg on the bigger half of the meat and the smaller bit of meat on top of the egg – this will help to encase the entire egg in the sausage meat.
6. Once all the eggs are covered in sausage meat, have a little production line set up with the bowls of flour, beaten egg and panko breadcrumbs all in a line. Cover your scotch eggs first with flour, then egg, then the breadcrumbs before placing on a baking tray.
7. Once all the eggs are breaded, heat the oil in a deep saucepan. You’ll know when the oil is ready if a crumb dropped in is sizzling.
8. Fry the eggs in batches of two until they are golden. It only took about three or so minutes. Place the golden scotch eggs on a clean baking tray.
9. Bake in the preheated oven for a further 8 minutes before serving.

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If you have made this, please let me know in the comments below or post your picture on Instagram.

If you liked this, why not check out some of my other recipes: