Baked duck eggs with asparagus, prosciutto and Gruyère

Having received some fresh duck eggs as a gift, I decided to bake them 'en cocotte' (in pots) for Sunday morning brunch. This is something I've never actually made before, but I tasted a similar recipe whilst interning at Good Food magazine, and they were so delicious I've been craving them ever since. So having got these beautiful eggs, I decided to now was the time to try it.

One great thing about baked eggs is you can make up the pots the night before, cover them and store in the fridge overnight, so all you have to do in the morning is roll out of bed, stick the oven on and pop them in. There are so many varieties of eggs en cocotte- you can add leeks, crème fraiche, mushrooms, smoked salmon- whatever you fancy. I decided to go with asparagus for a bit of freshness, prosciutto for some saltiness, and Gruyère for some gooey-ness!


Ingredients:

Butter (for greasing the ramekins)
4 eggs (duck or hen)
4 slices of prosciutto ham
Small bunch of asparagus, washed
Fresh herbs (I used chives and parsley), washed and finely chopped.
Double cream
Small block Gruyère cheese
Salt
Pepper
Good quality bread (I used sourdough) for serving.

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C

2. Boil or steam the asparagus for approx. 2 mins depending on the size of the asparagus. You want it to be very much al dente as it will continue cooking in the oven later on. Remove and drain, then roughly chop so it's a nice size to fit into your ramekins.

3. Butter 4 oven-proof ramekin dishes.

4. Cut the prosciutto into strips and add to your prepared ramekins.

5. Crack one egg into each ramekin.

6. Divide the asparagus equally between your ramekins, pushing it down to fit it all in (careful not to break the yolks).

7. Sprinkle some of your chopped herbs into eat pot, reserving some to sprinkle on before serving.

8. Grate a generous amount of gruyère onto each ramekin.

7. Season well with salt and pepper.

8. Place the pots in a baking tray, and pour in some lukewarm water, so that it comes up to about half way up the sides of your pots.

9. Place in the oven and cook for around 15 mins, for runny eggs. Bear in mind that they will keep cooking a bit when you take them out the oven, so to under-do them slightly is probably the way to go.

10. Remove from the oven, sprinkle with a bit more salt and pepper and the remainder of your fresh herbs, Place your pots on plates, and serve with some buttered sourdough soldiers!

Before

After. Delicious baked duck eggs with asparagus, prosciutto and gruyère.