For the Love of La Quercia
La Quercia is a socially-conscious company I discovered a few years ago and one I’ve become a huge fan of. They came onto my radar back then as a group of people who were making a prosciutto here in the U.S. that was actually comparable to the Italian stuff.
I told my husband about La Quercia and he ordered a full, bone-in slab of prosciutto that we ate until we couldn’t eat anymore. Eventually, we were kind enough to share some with family and friends. (You’re welcome)
Recently, I ordered some of their Speck and Lomo from Zingerman’s, who was running a pretty good sale on some of their La Quercia products. (If you’ve not checked out the online store to world-famous Zingerman’s, please take a minute and do so!) Not surprisingly, these were just as delicious as their prosciutto. Not the greatest photo but here’s a shot of what I ordered:
So, after enjoying some of my purchase as part of a charcuterie and cheese plate, I was on to a better way to highlight these.
As luck would have it, I made a small batch of my homemade ricotta cheese last weekend, so I also had some of that looking to be used.
Not so unusual is that I also had some baby arugula on hand. If you’ve read my About Me page or just happened to realize the play on words, my blog name is an ode to my love for spicy little rocket leaves. So with these ingredients in mind, I threw together some quick French Bread last night and sliced it and assembled this for our dinner:
This was very simple but absolutely delicious – I made this to serve just the two of us. I’ve listed the ingredients in the order I assembled these.
Crostini with Ricotta, Arugula, Poached Egg and Crispy Speck
- 4 slices of French bread, toasted on both sides and rubbed with a sliced clove of garlic
- Ricotta cheese
- Arugula
- 4 Poached eggs
- 2 paper-thin slices of La Quercia Speck, crisped in a heavy pan and broken into pieces
- Freshly ground black pepper
How to make a poached egg? Here’s how I do mine:
Bring a deep skillet of water with 1/2 cup of white vinegar added to it to a slow boil. Gently add eggs to water. After 2 minutes of cooking, using a large spoon, gently turn each egg over in the water. Let simmer another minute to minute and a half and, using a slotted spoon, remove them from the water. I like to gently place spoon and egg on top of a paper towel to absorb some of the water before placing on plate or bread. You may have to play with this a bit – everyone’s idea of a slow boil/high simmer is different and everyone likes their eggs just a little different than the next person.
Pretty simple right? But packed with flavor and, if you love poached eggs like we do, a fantastic Friday night dinner.
Enjoy!
Yum. Thanks for the tip on turning the egg after 2 minutes. Does this help keep the egg whites tucked in more so that they don’t spread out… or is there another reason for doing this? I am currently working on my egg poaching skills!
I’ve read and tried so many tips to poaching eggs and keeping the whites together and yes, this still works the best for me. I’ve seen where people swirl the water and then add the egg to the swirl, but this seems to make more of a mess of the whites. As long as I hold the egg very close to the water and place it in gently, I have the best luck!
Looks delicious!!!!
Thanks – it was!
😀
i stirred the eggs and nearly had scrambled eggs rather than poached eggs. Thanks for the tip. Really enjoyed your post.
Those damned eggs can be tricky but boy, I love ’em! Thanks Don!
Your meal sounds perfect…light but very flavorful.
Thank you! I should have taken a shot with the poached egg cut open and oozing down the side of it…but sometimes a girl’s just got to eat. 🙂
Your photos were so good…I’ll just use my imagination on how nice the oozing egg looked.
This not only reads wonderfully, but the recipe seems divine and the images convey the mouth watering appeal of the recipe. I shall keep my eyes open in the UK for La Quercia products. Thanks for sharing Lesley and I hope you and yours had a great Easter
Thanks James! I bought some umbrella lights to take photos inside and this was one of my first subjects…I think I’m professional now. lol! I hope you and yours had a wonderful Easter too!
Thanks for making me smile and yes thanks, I had a quiet Easter with my lion-head rabbit Dillon. My parents were away abroad visiting my sister .
Why have you not posted photos of your lion-headed rabbit? I imagine s/he’s gorgeous…I had to look at Google images, as I’d never heard of them before! Amazing.
Hi Lesley, I have posted on a couple of occasions but he does deserve another photo shoot out in the garden very soon. I hope you are well and have a great weekend and I will attempt to send you the link to dillon’s posts. off to do a 15 mile walk along the owns as the day has started with a great sunrise.
The day is gray and dreary here today – I hope your walk was great! I found Dillon after a bit of deeper perusing..don’t know how I missed him before, though I see a number of other great shots of yours I’ve also missed!
I am sorry to hear about the gray day but I hope today is somewhat better. The walk was fantastic thank you for asking and I have to admit the changes in weather made it even more enjoyable from a photography stand point of view. Thank you very much Lesley about your comment regarding Dillon, he is cute but knows when to be grumpy and get his own way.
Today is sunny, thank goodness. Too many gray days doesn’t bode well with my temperament. lol! Glad you had a fantastic walk. Dillon sounds a lot like my two cats: cute but cranky sometimes and always wanting their own way. 🙂
It’s always interesting to hear about good food producers. Thanks! And this recipe looks great too.
They seem like a great group of people who are very serious about the quality of their product. I’m not one to recommend a lot of places but I’ve always enjoyed their products immensely. Thanks!
UGH! My biggest problem is that I always peek in here right before I’m about to make dinner. And then I see your pictures. And then I see what’s in my fridge. Purely frustrating and not a little tortuous.
Make more.
🙂 Thank you – that’s a huge compliment! I’ve been a terrible blogger lately so thanks for stopping by!