Scottish Christmas Dinner: Scotch Eggs

All children seem to be picky eaters in their early years.  Flavors, textures, and colors freak out small children in turns causing temper tantrums (from both children and parents), headaches, and tons of partially eaten meals finally being discarded after day three of the standoff.  (Child 1, Parents 0)  Our middle child has been perhaps our most picky eater.  I could give you some other examples, but frankly, it really doesn't get much more picky than refusing to drink anything but milk for the first six years of your life.  (Because water is disgusting!)  After a dehydration scare on a family hike, I got officially upset enough to dig my heels in and insist that he try new things in spite of the family doctor continually assuring me that there was nothing wrong--in fact, I should be thrilled!--with him only drinking milk.

(Okay... so I get that some parents can't get junior to drink milk after a certain age, but milk is not available at all restaurants and uckily enough, curdles when you try to take it on hikes and to sporting events.  Bleh.)

Milk at meals was withheld until first half an inch, then an inch, and finally half a glass of water was consumed first.  Water bottles for hikes were marked off in permanent marker to indicate how much had to be sipped (with a minimum of grimacing) at each stopping point before favorite snacks would be trotted out.  Juice was finally introduced on occasion a few months later.  There were still pitched battles over dinner, but in time, we had settled on a repertoire of about three dozen meals that I could reliably get him to eat.

But that is boring.  It's boring to make and boring to eat.

Two years ago, I started digging into my long neglected cookbooks, trying out new recipes with the condition that my children could give the new meal a thumbs up or down.  Things universally panned, therefore, would only ever have to be eaten once.  There was some balking at first, but the promise of "just this once" has gotten my middle child to try a much wider variety of food and given me a chance to stretch my culinary wings.  Our Christmas feasts from other countries are just part of the bigger plan.

A few weeks ago, I mentioned to our middle child that our first dinner this year would be from Scotland.  He beamed.  He remembered that last year, Scottish Christmas dinner centered around a meat pie.  Meat pies are guy food.  This was a very good idea.

Then I told him that we would be trying Scotch Eggs this year.

"Scotch Eggs?" he inquired, narrowing his eyes slightly.

"Hard boiled eggs wrapped in sausage and then deep fried," I replied.

His eyebrows went up.  He was having a hard time seeing the downsides of this.  More guy food.

They turned out great.  The only problem is that they are so filling, especially for the girls in our family, that it was hard to eat them as part of a larger meal.  We won't be having them for dinner next year, but perhaps they can be part of a special breakfast on St. Andrew's Day (November 30th) every year.

Most of the recipes that I found used approximately the same ingredients and directions, but I did run across an option to bake them (400F for 30 minutes) after assembly.  I am not sure how that would work with the rest of our menu since the other items cook at a much lower temperature and would be cold after the eggs finally came out, but you should know that it is an option for a less greasy result.  One thing that I did like was the option to make the eggs up earlier in the day and then refrigerate until it was time to cook them.  This makes it easier to include them in a more complicated menu.

Scotch Eggs -- Yield: 8 eggs
8 hard-boiled eggs, cooled and shelled
1-1 1/2 lb. bulk sausage (pork is traditional, but you can also use turkey)
1 cup flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
2 cups bread crumbs (regular, seasoned, or Panko all work great)

Cook, cool, and peel the eight eggs.  Divide the sausage into eight portions.  Flatten each portion into a very thin disk and then wrap it around one egg, pinching it shut to coat thoroughly.   (I found it very hard to get good coverage with a single pound of sausage, so you might want to purchase a little extra the first time you try this.)

Set up a breading station with three bowls:
1.  Flour mixed with the salt and pepper
2.  Eggs beaten with the milk
3.  Bread crumbs

Coat each ball in flour, then egg, then bread crumbs.  (Breaded eggs can be refrigerated up to one day in advance.)  Pour enough oil into a deep pan such that it will cover a submerged egg and preheat it to 350F, using a thermometer to ensure the correct temperature.  Cook each egg for 5 minutes or until golden brown.  Drain on paper towels and serve warm either plain or with your favorite mustard.  (Or alternately, bake for 30 minutes in an oven set to 400F.)