New Orleans Brunch

New Orleans invented the American brunch. Not the concept of eating late on a weekend — but the institution: the multi-course, boozy, two-hour meal served between 10am and 2pm at restaurants that take the meal as seriously as dinner service. Antoine's, Brennan's, Commander's Palace, Galatoire's — each developed a brunch menu that includes dishes found nowhere else. Eggs Sardou (poached eggs on artichoke bottoms with creamed spinach and hollandaise) was created at Antoine's in 1908, named for the French dramatist Victorien Sardou. Eggs Hussarde (poached eggs on Holland rusks with marchand de vin sauce and hollandaise) was created at Brennan's. These are not adaptations of French technique — they are New Orleans inventions built from French components.

Eggs Sardou specifically: two poached eggs set on artichoke bottoms (not hearts — the broad, concave bottom that cradles the egg), bedded on creamed spinach, draped in hollandaise, and served with optional ham or anchovy. The dish is an architecture of textures: the soft yolk against the firm-but-yielding artichoke, the creamy spinach beneath, the rich, lemony hollandaise over everything. The plate should arrive with the hollandaise still shimmering — a broken or cooled hollandaise fails the dish.

• Eggs Benedict (the New York competitor — similar architecture, Canadian bacon and English muffin instead of artichoke and creamed spinach)
• Eggs Florentine (the spinach-and-egg combination without the artichoke)
• Turkish *çılbır* (poached eggs on yogurt with spiced butter — the same "runny egg as sauce" principle)
• Israeli *shakshuka* (eggs poached in tomato sauce — a different execution of poached eggs in a flavoured base)
• The universal principle: a perfectly poached egg is a sauce delivery system
• Every culture that mastered the poached egg built a dish around the flowing yolk

Eggs Sardou is one course in a New Orleans brunch. Before it: a cocktail and possibly an appetiser (shrimp remoulade, crabmeat ravigote). After it: possibly a fish or meat course, certainly dessert (Bananas Foster, bread pudding). The brunch is the meal, not a quick stop between errands. Two hours minimum.