Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •12-inch heavy skillet or sauté pan
• •Wooden spoon or heat-proof spatula

Instructions

1. 1

   Warm the oil and onion

   Set a wide, heavy skillet over medium-low heat and add the olive oil. When the oil shimmers, add the sliced onion with a pinch of salt. Cook slowly, stirring occasionally, until the onion turns soft and translucent, about ten minutes. You are not looking for color here. You are coaxing out sweetness.

   A wide pan matters. The vegetables need room to release their moisture without crowding, or they will steam instead of soften.
2. 2

   Add the peppers

   Add all the pepper strips to the pan. Season with another pinch of salt. Stir everything together and let the peppers cook gently for twenty minutes, stirring every few minutes. They will collapse and become silky. The kitchen will start to smell sweet and warm. This patience is the whole point of pipérade.

3. 3

   Introduce tomatoes and garlic

   Add the chopped tomatoes, minced garlic, piment d'Espelette, and the remaining salt. Stir to combine. Let everything simmer together for another fifteen minutes, until the tomatoes have broken down completely and the mixture looks like a thick, jammy stew. The vegetables should melt into one another, distinct but unified.

4. 4

   Taste and adjust

   Taste the pipérade. It should be sweet from the peppers, bright from the tomatoes, gently warm from the Espelette. Add more salt if needed. Grind in black pepper. This vegetable base is the foundation of everything that follows. Get it right before you touch the eggs.

   The pipérade can rest at this point. Some cooks make it a day ahead and warm it gently before adding eggs. The flavors only deepen with time.
5. 5

   Fold in the eggs

   Crack the eggs into a bowl and beat them lightly with a fork, just enough to combine yolks and whites. Reduce the heat to low. Pour the eggs over the warm pipérade and use a wooden spoon or spatula to fold them through gently, pulling from the edges toward the center. The eggs should form soft, creamy curds throughout the vegetables. This takes three to four minutes. Remove the pan from heat while the eggs still look slightly underdone. They will finish cooking in the residual warmth.

6. 6

   Finish and serve

   Scatter the parsley over the top. Drizzle with a thread of good olive oil. Serve immediately from the pan, with thick slices of crusty bread to soak up every bit. This is food meant for the middle of the table, for reaching in with your bread and eating without ceremony.

Chef Tips

• •Piment d'Espelette is the traditional pepper of the Basque Country, mildly spicy with a sweet, almost fruity warmth. If you cannot find it, sweet paprika works, though the flavor will be gentler. Seek out Espelette if you can. It transforms the dish.
• •The ratio of red to green peppers matters. Red peppers bring sweetness; green peppers bring a slight bitterness that keeps the dish from cloying. Adjust to your taste, but do not skip the green.
• •In winter, when fresh tomatoes taste like nothing, use good canned whole tomatoes from San Marzano. Drain them, crush them by hand, and proceed. This is honest cooking, not performance.
• •Some Basque cooks add thin slices of Bayonne ham or a few strips of good bacon to the onions at the start. It is not necessary, but it is very good.

Advance Preparation

• •The pepper and tomato base (before adding eggs) can be made up to two days ahead and refrigerated. Warm it gently over low heat before folding in the eggs.
• •Once the eggs are added, the dish must be served immediately. There is no reheating a pipérade.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 320g)