Egg-in-the-Hole

Per person:

1 egg
1 slice white, rye or light whole-wheat bread
½ Tablespoon room-temperature butter
½ Tablespoon or so olive oil
salt and freshly-ground pepper

Crack your egg into a little cup. Butter bread on both sides. Stamp out a 2 to 2 ½ inch circle from the middle of the bread with a glass rim or cookie cutter. Keep the bread round you’ve cut out.

Heat a cast-iron pan (or other pan with a non-sticking surface) on medium-high. Add oil to the pan and cook bread slice until golden on one side, with the little bread round along-side it. Turn bread over to start cooking the other side. Immediately add a drip of extra oil to the hole in the center of the bread slice. Neatly slide your egg from the cup into the hole in the bread. Cook until the egg white sets and sticks to the bread encircling it, about a couple of minutes. Sprinkle yolk with salt and pepper and another drip of oil. Slide a spatula under the bread and egg to loosen, and carefully turn the whole thing over. Cook for another 30 seconds or so, just to finish setting the egg white while keeping the yolk soft and runny. Turn the eggy-bread on to a plate, nicest side up. Top with the little golden bread disc.