Plates | Mexican Eggs Benedict

A few weeks ago when I was in Ventura, I had one of my favorite brunches ever. Yes, that’s right, ever! It was at a cute restaurant called Café Nouveau. The dish was a Mexican Eggs Benedict--in place of the English muffin, there was a jalapeno tamale! It was served with eggs, avocado, pico de gallo, and a great onion/potato hash.

I decided to have friends over and recreate the dish. Here's what it looked like:  

Here’s the recipe I created: 

Potato/Onion Hash:

1 bag of little red potatoes, diced

Optional: 1-2 sweet potatoes
1 white onion

Butter

Seasoning to taste, I use the 21 Salute seasoning from Trader Joe’s

Directions: The key to this is slow and steady. I melted some butter in a large pan and dumped in the diced potatoes and onions. I kept the heat on medium with the intention of cooking the mix for 45 minutes or so. I wanted those onions to get really soft. I generously sprinkled the seasoning over the top. Every 10 minutes or so, I stirred. Not too often because I didn't want the potatoes to get mushy.

Pico de Gallo
Ingredients
1 red onion
a few small tomatoes
Cilantro
1 lime

Directions: Chop the red onion and the tomatoes, mix in a bowl, add chopped up cilantro, and add the juice of 1 lime. Pretty simple, so colorful, so fresh!

"Eggs Benedict"
Ingredients

6 pack of cheese tamales from Trader Joe's

Eggs

Avocado

Pico de gallo

Salsa for topping

Optional--crock pot shredded chicken
(I did not attempt a hollandaise sauce)

Directions: 
I cooked chicken in the crock pot over night in enchilada sauce from Trader Joe's. All I had to do after the 7 or so hours was shred it. I made this because Jon is a very hungry guy and he didn't think tamales and eggs would be enough.

As for the rest of the dish, I threw the tamales in the frying pan to cook and crisp up. I used a pretty generous tablespoon of butter. The tamales are the base of the dish. Next up--the eggs. I don't like runny eggs, so I made mine over hard, but you can make them however you like. This tops the tamale. On top of the egg, I put the avocado, some pico and salsa. Maybe next time I will attempt the hollandaise sauce!

Here's the plating in pictures: