Poached Egg with Leeks, Pork and Japanese Soy

Try this recipe for Poached egg with leeks, pork and japanese soy. Add some Asian inspiration to your next dinner.

This dish is not very complicated, it’s basically bacon and eggs with soy sauce. At least flavorwise. I wanted to make a small dish out of whatever I happened to have in my fridge, that is a great tip when you are stuck creatively.

Going shopping and having everything available but I rarely get very creative when I do that. For me the best ideas or at least the birth of a great idea comes when there is less to chose from or when there are other limitations. Now don’t make the mistake of having this approach if you’re very hungry, that will work poorly. But searching through the fridge when the mission is to do something tasty for just one, buying nothing could turn out to be a great idea.

I had some leftover salted already fried leftover pork, some eggs and a leek that was kind of forgotten. The salted pork is exactly like unsmoked bacon and eggs is bacon’s best friend. If you’ve had bacon and eggs you already know that adding some fried onions to that won’t spoil anything. So why not with leeks?

To add a little bit of Asian flavor I added some Japanese soy to the pork once it was fried. It was just the thing to make the dish not just breakfast. Now try it.

Poached Egg with Leeks, Pork and Japanese Soy

serves 4 as an appetizer

4 eggs
½ leek
2 tbsp Japanese soy sauce
1 tbsp butter
vinegar (for poaching the egg)
salt
150g / 5 oz salted sliced pork belly
olive oil

The leeks

Start with the leek, cut it in half lengthwise and then into a few pieces about an inch long. Rinse with water and fry in olive oil cut side down on high heat, then lower the temperature. Tear the leaves of the leek apart and keep cooking on low temperature for a minute or two. This will give the leek a blackened roasted edge like you can see in my photo. It adds some flavor and it looks kind of cool. Set the leek aside.

The pork belly

Cut the pork belly into thin strips and then fry in a pan with no oil. There is enough fat in the meat to make it perfectly crisp. Once crisp add the soy sauce and butter and let it melt together into a sauce, there will only be a few drops.

Poaching the egg

I actually took this instruction from a similar dish with bacon and endives I did awhile back, it’s the same method. And if you like this recipe you’ll like that one too, check it out here.

First combine the vinegar with 3 parts water in four small bowls, then carefully crack one egg in each bowl and set aside. Leave the eggs there until poaching. The acid in the vinegar will make the egg coagulate a little bit and the will be slightly firm when the are transferred to the boiling water when poaching. There are many ways to poach an egg but this is my preferred way. Bring some water to a boil in a big pot.

Lower to temperature of the boiling water to a slow simmer and carefully add the eggs, a almost lower to bowl so each egg can slide slowly out of the bowl and into the water, poach for about 3-4 minutes. You can lift out one egg after a minute or two and carefully feel if the yolk are soft or hard by poking it with a finger. You want it soft of course.

Plating

Carefully reheat the leeks and pork if necessary, add the leek and the egg on the side. Spoon the pork on top and make sure to use all of the soy and butter sauce. Add a few drops of olive oil and serve. Good luck.