Vegans Eat Pencil Shavings: The Best Vegan Poached Egg on the Internet

I've spent a good year brainstorming how to create the perfect vegan poached egg. Some of my other food blogger contemporaries have come up with their own renditions, but I think mine comes the closest so far.

Take a look for yourself....

The Best Vegan Poached Eggs on the Internet. Hands down.

Ingredients

For the Egg Yolks

1 tbsp Earth Balance

1 tbsp nutritional yeast

For the Egg Whites

3/4 cup medium tofu
1/4 tsp Kala Namak*
1 tsp agar agar
3 tbsp water

For the Cheese Sauce

1/2 cup Daiya

1/2 cup soy milk

1 English Muffin

Basil leaves for garnish

Freshly ground pepper

Special Equipment

Silicon egg cups

Mini Hand chopper (you could use a food processor or a blender as well)

Silicon egg poaching cups are the key to success in this recipe

Directions

Make the compound butter

1) Fill frying pan with water and bring to a boil

2) While waiting for the water to boil, make the 'egg yolk' by mixing the Earth Balance and nutritional yeast together to form a compound butter

3) Put compound butter in fridge

If your Earth Balance is at room temperature you can mix the compound butter more easily

Make the Cheese Sauce

1) Put the Daiya and almond milk in a saucepan.

2) Bring to a boil, stirring constantly

3) Reduce heat to low and set sauce aside, stirring occasionally

To Make the 'Eggs'

1) Blend the tofu, Kala Namak, agar agar and water in hand chopper. Blend til very smooth.

Kala Namak is an Indian salt containing sulfur, which gives the tofu it's egg flavor.

2) Spray the silicon egg poaching cups with vegetable oil

3) Fill cup 2/3 of the way up with tofu mixture

The agar agar acts as a solidifying agent and helps set the tofu.

4) Place egg cups in boiling water and cover with lid. Cook for 5 to 7 minutes, or until the sides of the tofu are firm and pull away from the sides of the cup.

5) Take a teaspoon and gently spoon out some tofu from the centre of each 'egg'. You want to make a small hole for the compound butter to sit in. Careful not to spoon all the way to the bottom or your compound butter will leak out.

6) Take the compound butter out of the fridge. Use a clean spoon to spoon half of the butter into each hole.

Try not to get any compound butter outside the hole or your eggs won't seal properly

7) QUICKLY spoon the remaining tofu over the compound butter and spread til smooth.

You want to seal the compound butter inside like an egg yolk, and make sure it doesn't leak out.

8) Cover the pan with lid again and cook for 7 to 10 more minutes. To check if they are done, jiggle the moulds. The edges should pull away from the mould and the centre should be set.

To Plate the Dish

1) Lightly toast the English muffins

2) Take the egg poaching cups out of the pan

3) Cover each egg poaching cup with 1/2 an English muffin