Use your leftover Easter ham with asparagus, Hollandaise, and over-easy eggs to make Country Eggs Benedict for brunch, lunch, or dinner!
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 30 minutesminutes
Total Time 35 minutesminutes
Servings 6servings
Ingredients
For the asparagus:
1bunchfresh asparagus
2tablespoonsolive oil
Salt and pepper
For the eggs:
6eggs
2tablespoonsbutter
2tablespoonscanola oil
For the sauce:
3egg yolks
1tablespoonlemon juice
½cupfirm butter
1teaspoonsnipped chives
1teaspoonfinely chopped parsley
For Assembly:
6sliceswhole grain or whole wheat breadtoasted
6slicescooked ham
Additional chopped chives and/or parsley for serving.
Instructions
Roast the asparagus:
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
Trim any tough ends from the asparagus and place in a single layer on a baking sheet.
Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roll or toss the asparagus to evenly distribute the oil over all the spears.
Cook for approximately 20 minutes. Exact cooking time will depend on the thickness of the spears. Start checking after about 15 minutes and use your own judgment as to when the spears are done.
Remove from the oven and set aside.
Prepare the hollandaise sauce:
Place the egg yolks and lemon juice in a medium saucepan and stir with a wire whisk.
Add half the butter. Heat over very low heat, whisking constantly until the butter has melted.
Add the remaining butter and continue whisking until the butter is melted and the sauce thickens.
When the sauce has thickened, stir in the chives and parsley. Keep over very low heat.
Toast the bread, remove the crusts and set aside.
Prepare the eggs:
In a medium non-stick skillet over medium heat, melt half the butter and half the canola oil. Add three of the eggs and cook until whites are cooked through but yolks are still runny.
Repeat with remaining butter, oil, and eggs.
Assembly:
For each serving, place one slice of toast on the plate. Top with a slice of cooked ham, several asparagus spears and a fried egg. Drizzle with a generous amount of the herbed hollandaise sauce and sprinkle with additional chives or parsley.
Notes
Tips and FAQs
Where the recipe says "very low," it means the lowest possible heat on your stove. Cooking over low heat will give the egg yolks time to cook without curdling.
There are a lot of little, separate steps in making this recipe, but it's not difficult. Be sure to read all the way through and assemble your ingredients before starting.
Cooking fried eggs is as simple as melting some butter and oil, cracking an egg into the pan and letting it sit there until it's done. To make it even easier, crack each egg individually into a small cup and then slide it from the cup into the pan.
Cutting the crusts off the toast isn't absolutely essential but it gives the finished presentation a bit of flair. Don't throw the crusts away. Keep them in a ziptop bag in the freezer and use them from bread crumbs later.
Don't be intimidated by the thought of making hollandaise sauce. It's nothing but eggs, butter, lemon juice, and a few herbs cooked together. Follow my easy recipe and you'll have a delicious sauce!
What size eggs do you use? In all my recipes, I use large eggs unless specified otherwise.I don't like runny eggs. Can I cook mine longer? Of course. You can cook your eggs any way you like. You could even substitute in scrambled eggs.What about the bread? Any suggestions for substitutes? Yep. Use any kind of bread under the sun that you like. You can even use the leftover dinner rolls from Easter. Or that loaf of pumpernickel and rye that's lurking in the back of the freezer. Anything at all.My family just doesn't like asparagus. Any suggestions? Roasted broccoli, roasted cauliflower, even roasted zucchini would be delicious. Or just simply leave that part of the recipe out.