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So, hear me out: the most delicious egg dishes are made without baking. Through culinary experiments, I found that simply adding a lid generates steam for cooking the egg tops, resulting in perfectly cooked perfectly poached egg featuring set whites and flowing center. Direct oven heat of the oven acts stronger versus moist heat, often leading to dehydrate ingredients resulting in firm yolks. Here are two sauce options as inspiration, encouraging customization. The first features an easy turmeric coconut curry, while the merguez ragu is a riff on eggs in purgatory, or, to the likes of you and me, spicy tomato eggs.

Golden Coconut Sauce Baked Eggs (shown above)

Preparation A quick 10 minutes
Cooking time 55 minutes
Serves Two people

Extra virgin oil
One medium onion, skinned and diced
Sea salt
2 garlic cloves, minced garlic
Fresh ginger root, grated ginger
Golden spice
½ tbsp cumin seeds
6-8 curry leaves
Creamy coconut
Chickpeas
Basil leaves, with more for garnish
Fresh eggs
2 green finger chillies, finely sliced, to serve

Use a heavy skillet at moderate-high temperature. Pour in some oil, incorporate onions with some salt, and cook for five to six minutes. Incorporate aromatics and spices, leave to sizzle, occasionally stirring briefly, add coconut milk and the chickpeas and their tin liquid. Heat until boiling, reduce to a simmer, and leave it to tick over for 30-35 minutes, when sauce is rich and yellow. Season with salt, then stir in the basil leaves.

With a spoon’s back forming small wells in the sauce, add eggs individually. Sprinkle the top of each egg with a little salt, then cover the pan with a lid, and cook on a low heat briefly, until the whites are set and the yolks just warm. Turn off stove, top with fresh herbs and thinly sliced finger chillies, then serve immediately.

Spicy Sausage Sauce with Tangy Peppers Steamed Eggs

Preparation 10 min
Cooking time 45 min
Serves Two portions

Olive oil
2 merguez-style lamb sausages
Harissa paste
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
400g good-quality tinned tomatoes
Salt
Four eggs
Pickled peppers, coarsely cut
1 small handful fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
Creamy yogurt
1 lemon, cut into wedges, as garnish

Heat a skillet at moderate temperature. Add two tablespoons of olive oil once hot, remove the skins from the sausages forming small bits into the skillet, resembling tiny meatballs. Lower temperature, brown the meat slowly, so it renders out all that spicy, flavour-packed fat. Move sausage pieces as they cook, to brown evenly.

Once browned, add the harissa, cumin seeds and sliced garlic to the pot, increase to medium heat fry with mixing, for three to four minutes, until aromatic, and the garlic has lost its raw edge. Tip in the tomatoes, season with salt let it bubble. Turn down the heat to low and simmer slowly about 20 minutes. Ragu thickens, intensify in color, while the oils split and rise to the top.

Use the back of a spoon making indentations in the sauce, add eggs individually. Sprinkle the top of each egg with salt, cover skillet. Simmer briefly over a low heat, when eggs set and the yolks just warm.

Turn off stove, finish with chopped pickled peppers, parsley, a blob of yoghurt, and oil splash, with lemon on side.