Cooking For Engineers

[Dilbert]

when the pandemic shut down the world, we still had a craving for some food items - egg mcmuffin with sausage&cheese was one.
which we would indulge in about once a year . . . but a home made scrumptious sounded like a good idea.

so - here's my egg McMuffin with sausage. goes like:

The Sausage
I buy a one pound 'roll' (Bob Evans Original is my fav) and slice it into 10-12 pieces.
When fried, sausage likes to shrivel & get thick, so I pound the 12 sliced rounds to "thin" - pan fry to roughly 80% done, freeze patties.
a frozen patty takes 3 minutes at 30% power in my microwave, with a 10 second 100% power blast at the end.
Note 1: your microwave will vary - experiment for optimum results.
Note 2: fatty stuff like sausage should be reheated slowly; heat does not move quickly through fats - too high too fast = sausage puck.

Obviously, one can do this 'from fresh' - the par-fry + reheat makes for a faster 'fast food' execution.
after one, two tries this is literally start to plate in 5 - 6 minutes.

sliced&schnitzeled thin:
pan fried to half-done:

pan fried


patted to 'degrease'


refrigerate to chill, then overnight freeze into sausage chips


The Egg
USDA Large / EU Medium egg. I use an egg ring, as pictured, preheated in the pan, sides of the ring slathered with olive oil just before putting in the egg to minimize sticking.
Not yet found an egg ring that is truly non-stick...
recommendation: crack the egg into a small bowl, then pour into egg ring.
As the white is about 50% congealed, poke the yolk so it 'spills out.' If the yolk is not broken, it likely will remain liquidy and gush out when the sandwich is bitten into....
(See notes/links below) McDonalds, et. al., use steam to cook / set the top of the egg.
I flip the egg in the pan.


The Timing
Depends on your toaster, how crisp you like your English Muffin.
In my kitchen:
- frozen sausage patty goes into microwave, 3 minutes at 30%
- fatty stuff like sausage benefit from a rest period; heat only moves slowly thru fatty stuff.

when the sausage is 'done'
- I put the egg in the preheated pan/ring, start the English muffin toasting
- get a slice of cheese (American white, our preference) ready
- to gussy it up, cut the cheese slice round - using the egg ring/other

the egg is set, gets flipped
the English muffin pops up and goes to plate
sausage in the microwave gets a 10 second 100% power blast, to come out sizzling

Assembly
sausage on muffin bottom
topped with egg


egg topped with cheese slice
finished off with muffin top
in short order the cheese melts down from the egg/sausage patty heat.



and a nice breakfast treat


so, why go to all this trouble now that one can simply ziggy on down to Mickey D's and buy one?
DW has pronounced this effort superior to McDonalds. I have a couple ideas why:
#1 - it has never sat all wrapped up under a heat lamp/on a hot shelf, , , becoming soggy.
#2 - the English Muffin is not frozen/thawed/stale - it's fresh.
#3 - McDonalds take out may be far away and it all gets cold before being consumed....
#4 - working from scratch, the muffin, egg and sausage patty are at slightly different temperatures - a very nice mouth treat.


Notes:
here's a link to a (not so) "hidden" camera where you can see the real time prep uninterrupted.
note the yolk poke @ 2:05
note the addition of water to the 'specialized grill' @ 2:30
and
also scraping the 'bottom crust / wasted' egg off the grill at completion @ 6:30
that's a bit of a shocker.
https://youtu.be/hTYk69JuyyQ

and here's a link to an egg cracking contest- but take note of the specialized 'egg ring set and cover, with steam cup'
yoke poke @ 0:20 and water for steam immediately following.
https://youtu.be/FGB4eDT6TrE

this is a McD issued fluff piece - the reality videos above support the claims and are much more informative:
https://youtu.be/5GNSsRJLj_8