🇮🇳 India · Family: Pav & Pao · Region: Mumbai · Heat: Griddled · Bread: pav · Proteins: egg
Ingredients
Egg keema pav is the Mumbai minced-meat plate with an egg on it: spiced keema topped with scrambled or fried egg, eaten with soft pav. The point of the egg is not garnish but a second protein and a fat-rich layer that rounds out the heat of the mince and gives the pav something to mop. The angle is the meeting of two cooked elements, a deeply browned, dry-edged keema and an egg added on top, with the bread acting as the tool that scoops both.
The build is straightforward but order-sensitive. Minced meat is cooked down with onion, ginger-garlic, tomato, and a hot masala until the fat separates and the mixture is thick and dry rather than soupy. The egg is added at the end, either scrambled loosely through the surface of the keema or fried and laid on top, so it stays soft against the firmer mince. Pav is split and crisped on the griddle, often in the keema's own fat, and served alongside for tearing and scooping. Good execution shows a keema that is deeply browned and not watery, an egg that is just set and still tender so it contrasts with the mince rather than matching its texture, and pav that is hot and lightly crisped. Sloppy execution means a thin, greasy or watery keema that soaks the bread, an egg overcooked dry and crumbly so it adds nothing, pav served cold and untoasted, or so much loose fat that the dish turns oily instead of rich.
Egg keema pav shifts by the meat, the heat, and how the egg is treated. The mince may be mutton, chicken, or beef depending on the kitchen; the masala ranges from moderate to aggressively hot; the egg may be a soft scramble worked through, a whole fried egg on top, or a runny yolk left to break into the mince. A plain keema pav without the egg, or a heavily fat-laden ghotala-style scramble, are their own preparations and deserve their own articles rather than being crowded in here. The constant is a dry, well-browned keema with a soft egg over it and pav to scoop, and no egg saves a watery, under-reduced mince.
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