Quail Salad with Eggs and Pancetta

Prepare a bowl of iced cold water. Put the quail eggs into boiling water for 1½ minutes and then take out with a slotted spoon and put in the iced water. Very carefully peel the eggs and place on a plate. Make a nice dressing with say five tablespoonfuls of good olive oil, a tablespoonful of lemon juice and season with salt.

Cut the crusts off the stale bread, make a lot of breadcrumbs and put on to a plate. Put flour on to a second plate and season with salt and pepper. Beat up a couple of eggs and put on to a third plate. Very lightly salt the eggs, cover with the flour followed by the egg and roll in the breadcrumbs. A Heston Blumenthal tip: then put the eggs in the freezer for a couple of minutes, take out and cover with more egg and then breadcrumbs.

Meanwhile put some rosemary in the quail, coat with a little olive oil and season well with salt and pepper. Wrap around one slice of pancetta and cook in the oven at 425°F/210°C/Reg7 for 25 minutes. Take out the oven and allow to cool a little. Grill the remainder of the pancetta around two slices per serving and drain on some kitchen paper.

Now for the exciting bit - heat up the cooking oil in a pan until it is quite hot, a few breadcrumbs dropped in should brown within seconds. Put the breadcrumbed eggs into a frying basket, lower into the oil and fry until just brown - ideally this should be very quick so that the eggs do not over cook. Take out the eggs and immediately cut in half. Don't forget to take the cooking pan off the heat!

Compose the dish by lightly dressing the leaves and putting on to serving dishes. Cut the breasts off the quail and put on top of the leaves along with the pancetta slices cut in half. Finally add the eggs and serve  Zoom  .