Recipe "Alho francês à Brás" (leeks with fried potatoes)

LissaC

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- olive oil
- one onion thinly sliced
- 1 bay leaf
- 4 eggs, beaten and seasoned with salt and pepper
- 200g of batata palha (potatoes thinly sliced the size and width of matchsticks, fried)
- 250g leeks, sliced
- chopped parsley or coriander leaves
- olives to garnish

1. Crack eggs, season them with salt and pepper and whisk them.
2. Heat olive oil in a pan, add sliced onion and bay leaf and stir fry a little. Remove bay leaf, add the leeks and stir fry under medium heat for about 5 minutes, without browning the leeks.
3. Add the potatoes, mix them with the leeks and onion to soften them a little.
4. Add the eggs and stir quickly, about 30 seconds, being careful not to scramble the eggs. You want the potatoes, leeks and onion to be involved with the eggs in a soft, creamy texture, you don't want scrambled eggs.
If it makes it easier, you can do this by turning off the heat and letting the pan sit in the residual heat, but remove the pan from the heat as soon as you're happy with the texture. Immediately remove the pan from the heat if the eggs are becoming scrambled.
5. Garnish with parsley or coriander leaves and olives and enjoy!

Notes:
- This recipe is traditionally done with codfish, making the popular traditional Portuguese dish "Bacalhau à Brás" (Codfish à Brás). "À Brás" is an unstralatable expression, it refers to the name of the creator of the dish although no one knows who it could have been. An Australian woman of Portuguese origins won an immunity pin with this dish on Masterchef Australia.
- In the traditional version of this recipe with the codfish, the codfish is first boiled, then shredded.
- You can make this recipe with almost any source of protein or vegetable you may want. The signatures part of the dish are the batata palha, and the "à Brás" technique of involving the ingredients in a creamy mix of eggs.
- If you cannot buy batata palha where you are, you can cut and fry the potatoes at home. They will probably be a bit thicker, but that's ok. You can find instructions for that here.
- The eggs can make or break this dish. The dish will be ruined if you let the eggs become hard and scrambled. It's really important that you incorporate the eggs fast and/or under very low heat, whatever works best for you. Personally I like to start by mixing the eggs with the pan on the stovetop, and then remove the pan from the heat and continue stirring.

Happy cooking!
 
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