"M for Monastic"

“Monastic cookery is perhaps the most honest expression of sensualism. It neither flaunts nor represses: it remembers.”

There is a particular elegance in restraint. A poached egg, warm and trembling like a held breath, laid upon a bed of buttered spinach — not flamboyant, but precise, contemplative, sensual.

This is not simply a dish: it is an act of liturgical intimacy, an homage to the spirit of “M for Monastic”, in which Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher writes of those “who feast on austerity with the attention of poets and the palate of lovers.”

In this plate, there is discipline without deprivation, purity without prudishness, pleasure without spectacle.

Imagine a kitchen before dawn. The hush of fabric. The cut of crusty bread. The hiss of butter just before it browns. A meal for one, or two — no conversation needed, just the sound of intent.

🥄  Ingredient List (for 2 servings)

2 free-range eggs, laid within 48 hours, best sourced from a local farm. The closer to the source, the more luminous the yolk — it should hold its shape like a gem.

300 g of fresh baby spinach, firm and verdant, harvested in the cool of morning.

1 tbsp cultured butter, preferably European-style, slightly tangy, with a higher butterfat content.

2 thin slices of sourdough or pain de campagne, toasted to a hushed gold.

1 tsp white wine vinegar, to coax the egg into shape.

Coarse sea salt (such as Maldon or fleur de sel).

A whisper of fresh black pepper — optional, like a final sigh.

1 drop of extra virgin olive oil, for those who believe even simplicity deserves a secret.

 Method — The Ceremony of Simplicity

1. Wilt the Spinach: The Breath Before the Silence

Rinse and dry the spinach thoroughly. In a heavy-bottomed pan, melt half the butter slowly, until it just begins to foam — not sizzle. Add the spinach and stir it gently, coaxing rather than cooking. Let it collapse into itself, still vibrant, never soggy. Salt lightly. Set aside, still warm.

2. Poach the Egg: The Precision of Letting Go

In a small saucepan, bring 6–8 cm of water to a bare simmer — not boiling. Add the vinegar. Crack each egg into its own ramekin.

Stir the water once, gently, to create a subtle whirlpool. Slide the egg into its current. Three minutes. Not four. Remove carefully with a slotted spoon and set it to rest on cloth or kitchen paper.

The white must be silk, the yolk like a suspended sun.

3. Toast the Bread: The Earth Beneath

Dry-toast the bread slices. No oil, no butter. The grain must speak alone. Break the toast, not slice it — shards are more honest than geometry.

4. Compose: The Still Life

Place a soft mound of warm spinach at the center of a shallow plate. Rest the poached egg gently atop it. Add one drop — only one — of olive oil if you must. Sprinkle a few crystals of sea salt.

Serve with broken toast leaning against the egg, like a poem left unfinished.

Serve with:

— Cool spring water in a stemmed glass — the kind you would find in a convent refectory.

— A glass of Pouilly-Fumé or Muscadet, if decadence is your heresy.

Music: Erik Satie’s Gymnopédies or silence. Especially silence.

M.F.K. Fisher believed that food was not about recipes, but about moments. The act of eating well, for her, was the highest form of being present... of seeing, sensing, savoring. In this dish, the monk becomes the epicure.

The restraint becomes a framework for desire.

The minimal becomes magnificent.

There is something radical in choosing so little, and choosing it well.

Each element here is weighted: the yolk as a metaphor for vulnerability; the spinach, with its green humility; the toast, as architecture of the everyday. It is a dish that demands nothing of the guest but attention — and, perhaps, reverence. When dishes are engineered to impress, this one asks you to listen... To the butter as it sighs... To the yolk as it spills... To your own quiet appetite.

“In a monastery, one learns to do without. In Fisher’s kitchen, one learns to do with less, but better.”

© Charlotte Madeleine Castelli | All rights reserved