Gari Scotch Eggs

Summer is coming with its excuse to sit in Brockwell Park in the sun watching the world go by and I like something more substantial to fortify me for this than a sandwich and frankly what could be better than a homemade Scotch egg in this situation? How about a completely wheat and gluten free version that takes under 30 minutes to make from scratch?

Your wish is my command with these. The egg is covered with sausagemeat as normal but then covered in dried gari instead of breadcrumbs. Gari is popular in West Africa and is made from cassava or tapioca. It is usually combined with liquid to make a variety of dishes, but left dried it makes an excellent subsitute to breadcrumbs holding its crunch nicely. You could use it for fried chicken, fish or vegetables as well. You can buy a bag of it easily just about anywhere in Brixton.

Gari Scotch Eggs (makes 4)

• 4 eggs, hard boiled
• 4 sausages
• 50g rice flour
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 100g gari
• 1 teaspoon ground crayfish
• 1 teaspoon mustard powder
• salt and pepper
• 250ml vegetable oil

Start by hard boiling your eggs. I have always found it tricky to get the timings just right until a fellow Bugle writer told me this trick. Bring a pan of water to a boil, add the room temperature eggs and boil vigorously for 1 minute. Take them off the heat and put the lid on the pan. Leave for 7 minutes. Lift out and put them into ice water. Cool for 5 minutes, then peel them and you will have perfectly boiled eggs with slightly soft golden yolks.

Once you’ve got the eggs right, everything else is about preparation. Use nice chilled sausages to cover the eggs to prevent gaps, lay out everything for covering the eggs and get your oil to the right temperature where it would shimmer with heat rather than bubble before you start and they are very easy to make.

Put the rice flour on a plate, crack the remaining eggs into a bowl and beat well and put  the gari in a shallow bowl. Arrange them in that order. Add the crayfish, mustard and salt and pepper to the gari.

Put your hand into the rice flour and take the skins off the sausages, flattening each one into a patty in your hand. Wrap this round the egg and pinch the ends together to prevent any gaps. Roll this in the rice flour, then dip into the beaten egg and then coat in the gari. To get a really good crisp coating, dip it back in the beaten egg and then in the gari again. Set aside and repeat til all the eggs are covered. You will have some flour, egg and gari left as it’s better to put slightly too much out than too little.

Heat the oil in a frying pan and fry two eggs at a time for about 2 minutes on each side until the outside is golden and crisp. Drain on kitchen roll and repeat with the other eggs. Eat warm or cold with some hot pepper jelly on the side. They will keep for a day or two in the fridge if you have willpower or make spares. They are so easy to make I might try a salt cod version next.