Insomnomnomnia

On the 2nd day of sugar free, my body gave to me

Lack of sleep and constantly needing to wee!

So, yesterday was pretty easy for me to get through food wise, but even after putting myself to bed early with a chamomile tea and a good book I noticed that at 3, 4, 5 and 6am I was still kid-at-Christmas wide awake, with my belly starting to grumble and my mind deciding that now is the best time to go over all thoughts I've ever had and some new ones thrown in for balance. Also, due to all of the tea and water consumption throughout the day, I had navigated my way through the cold, dark, treacherous bedroom terrain to the toilet for more times than I care to admit. Clearly my sleeping pattern needs addressing, so I have decided to push through until bedtime this evening, so please forgive any rambling, delusions or spelling mistakes that this may result in.

Despite having had no sleep at all, I feel pretty good today. Surprising really. Not massively hungry, no headaches, moodiness or feeling particularly tired. We'll see how long this good spell lasts...

Anyway, I fancied a bit of traditional style breakfasting this morning, but without meat or sugar, so I thought I'd cobble together some sort of Eggs Benedict-ish dish. I'm loathe to call it actual Eggs Benedict as I made a few substitutions and lazy, sleep deprived methodology meant it wasn't entirely on point, but it tasted Benedictine and filled the role of breakfast rather well, so I'm going to share the recipe with tips thrown in on how to do a better job than zombie me did. Give it a go!

Eggs Benedict-ish

serves 2

for the Hollandaisey:
4 egg yolks
1/2 lime (didn't have any lemons, but obviously the choice of citrus is yours)
75g melted butter
salt & pepper
cayenne

for the flatbread:
1 cup Dove's Farm gluten free plain flour
salt
2/3 cup water
mixed herbs

to poach:
2 eggs

1. Sieve the flour into a bowl, add in a pinch or two of salt and a sprinkling of dried herbs and mix. Slowly add in water whilst bringing the flour together to form a smooth dough. Use your noodle when making the dough, if it's too crumbly, add water by the spoonful, if it's too wet, a tsp of flour at a time, should help correct it. Although my dough looked good, it was a little on the dry side today and gluten free flour can always do with being slightly wetter than would normally be wise. Poke a smiley face in your dough (optional, if you're a fun sponge) and pop it to one side.
2. Pop your griddle on to heat.
3. OK, whilst your griddle is getting nice and toasty (boom-boom!), separate 4 egg yolks into a bowl. Don't you dare throw those whites away! They can be used for scramble, omelet, baking, face masks...you name it- put your goo to use. Squeeze your lemon or lime into your yolks and whisk until thicker and about doubled in size.
4. Pop your bowl over a barely simmering pan of water and keep whisking as you slowly pour in the melted butter. Now, this is where I got bored (have I mentioned how much sleep I haven't had?) and stopped whisking. As far as I was concerned my Hollandaise tasted Hollandaisey and was thick enough for me, so I decided I didn't care that it was a bit more yellow than the norm, didn't fancy one massive Popeye arm and wanted to appease the growling stomach beast, so I put the whisk down.
5. Right, split your dough in two and flatten as much as possible before slapping onto your griddle. Leave them alone for a while
6. Bring a pan of water to the boil and prep 2 eggs to poach.
7. Once your flatbreads are crispy on the outside and lift easily from your griddle, flip them. Now, my flatbreads were a little dry and weren't quite cooking as expected, so I added a few tablespoons of water directly to the breads as they cooked on the griddle which moistens and steams them through the centre.
8. Poach your eggs to your liking and serve it all up on top of each other in a pleasing arrangement. I suggest bread on the bottom and Hollandaise on the top. Maybe even a sprig of rosemary to pretend this wasn't an impatient rush job.
9. Munch! Lick the Hollandaise bowl leftovers. 

Don't forget to check your flour doesn't have any hidden sugary ingredients, including xantham gum. Read the ingredients and know what they are or I'll eat your cheese forever more.