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Meals · Skillet & sheet-pan mains

Huevos rotos con jamón (Spanish broken eggs over potatoes and ham)

33

Madrid's favourite late-night plate: golden potatoes piled up, draped with serrano ham and crowned with crisp-edged fried eggs that are broken at the table, so the yolks run down and become the sauce. The potatoes cook slowly in olive oil until soft and barely golden, so they drink up the yolk.

Time
65 min (15 prep + 50 cook)
Servings
4
Per serving
547 kcal
Protein
24 g

Ingredients

  • 2 lb (7 medium) gold potatoes, peeled, cut like thin chips about 1 cm (3/8 inch) thick
  • 2/3 cup olive oil, about half of it stays in the food; the rest is strained off and kept for cooking
  • 3/4 tsp salt
  • 8 large eggs
  • 3 1/2 oz jamón serrano, serrano ham, in thin slices

Steps

  1. Rinse the cut potatoes until the water runs clear and dry them very well in a clean towel.
  2. Pour half the oil into a wide frying pan over medium heat, and when it shimmers add half the potatoes. Turn them once, cover, lower the heat as far as it goes and cook for about 15 minutes, turning gently once or twice, until soft all the way through.
  3. Uncover, raise the heat to medium and cook for about 5 minutes, turning as little as you can, until lightly golden but not crisp. Lift them out with a slotted spoon, drain on paper and salt them. Add the rest of the oil to the pan and cook the second batch the same way, then pile all the potatoes onto a warm platter or four plates. Strain the oil and keep it.
  4. Heat 2 tablespoons of the strained oil in a nonstick frying pan over high heat. Fry the eggs 2–3 at a time for 1–2 minutes, spooning the hot oil over the whites, until the edges are crisp and lacy and the yolks still soft. Use 2 fresh tablespoons of the strained oil for each batch. What is left over keeps for cooking.
  5. Drape the ham over the hot potatoes so it softens, slide the eggs on top, and break the yolks with a fork at the table. Stir it all together and eat at once.

Good to know

Can I roast the potatoes instead?

Yes, for less oil, though they come out crisper and drier than the soft potatoes of the classic. Toss them with 5 teaspoons of oil, roast on hot sheet pans at 425°F for 35–40 minutes, turning twice, and fry the eggs in a tablespoon of fresh oil. It comes to about 38 instead of 33.

Do the yolks need to be runny?

They are the sauce, so traditionally yes. For anyone who should avoid soft yolks, use pasteurised eggs or cook them through and add a spoon of olive oil to the potatoes instead.

Per

Calories
172
Protein
(18%)
8 g
Fat
(55%)
10 g
Carbohydrates
(27%)
12 g
of which sugar
1 g
Fiber
1 g
Sodium
308 mg

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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. How

As written, 2187 kcal goes into the pot and 1479 g of ingredients comes out as about 1270 g of food: 172 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.