How do you like your eggs?

What do you have when you combine eggs with bits of meat, cheese, and vegetables?  Omelet? Quiche?  Frittata? Fancy scrambled eggs? All of these answers could be correct, but the methods of preparation makes the differences.
Omelets are popular and are made by cooking eggs in a shallow pan and folding the extra ingredients into the almost done egg mixture. Quiche is an egg custard with extra ingredients added, usually in a pie crust. It is baked in the oven. Frittatas are a creamy egg custard with the eggs mixed with cream and vegetables, meat and cheese added. It is made in a heavy skillet that cooks both on the stove top and in the oven.
Frittata is a popular egg preparation now and one that friends and I recently enjoyed when quilt-tripping to visit a friend in Denver. Our friend and her neighbor not only entertained us with a beautiful Sunday morning recital of classical duets played on a baby grand piano,  they also prepared a delicious brunch for us featuring a frittata.

Doesn't this look like a delicious brunch? It was! 

You can go shopping for special fresh ingredients of bell peppers, mushrooms, asparagus, tomatoes, and spinach for your frittata or you can look in the refrigerator and see what you have that needs to be used. Throw in a few chopped vegetables, and brown some meat and a frittata can be on the table in 20 minutes. The recipe I use is a ratio using whatever ingredients you have. For every six eggs, use 1/4 cup heavy cream, 1 cup cheese, and 2 cups total vegetables and meat. You'll need a heavy skillet such as a cast iron skillet or an oven-safe non-stick skillet. If your skillet isn't non-stick, be sure to use extra oil so the eggs don't stick to the pan.

The steps are simple:
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees with a rack set in the center of the oven.
2. Mix the eggs and cream with 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper and 1 teaspoon kosher salt.
3. Cook and drain the meat (bacon or sausage) leaving some fat in the skillet.
4. Saute the onions, green peppers, and other vegetables, starting with those that take the longest time to soften.
5. Wilt the spinach and add any fresh herbs you want to use. Cook and stir these for 30 seconds to 1 minute or until spinach wilts. Add the meat back in the pan and stir to distribute.
6. Add cheese and let it just start to melt.
7. Pour the egg mixture over the vegetables and meat and cook for a minute or two until the edges of the egg start to set.

My frittata at home in a cast iron skillet. 

8. Bake the frittata in the oven until the eggs are set 8 - 10 minutes (or longer for a big pan of frittata). If you'd like to brown and crisp the top, set the frittata under the broiler for a minute or two at the end of the cooking time.
Let set in the pan 5 minutes before slicing into wedges to serve.

The Charm of St. Patrick's Day

Our luck was good on Saturday for St. Patty's Day. A sunny day, less wind, and a family gathering to celebrate birthdays and a baptism. This brunch menu worked well for preparing ahead of time and easy to serve. Cinnamon rolls were made the evening before (favorite recipe on Nov. 17, 2017 blog). The fruit salad, greek yogurt, and breakfast casserole in a slow cooker were easy to assemble earlier in the morning. And the sausage cooked in the kitchen grill while the coffee perked.

Fruit salad is always a tasty and nutritious part of a brunch. I like to use a bag of mixed frozen fruit (Sam's Club has Dole frozen fruit in 5 bag packages). If the fruit pieces are large, rough chop them. I added frozen blueberries and a few more frozen strawberries (from the frozen fruit boxes our UMW sells as a fund raiser) and fresh fruit of bananas and kiwi. The dressing is a mixture of agave syrup (or you could use honey), lemon juice (that helps keep the fruit from browning also), and crystalized ginger. You could also add poppy seeds.

BREAKFAST CASSEROLE (SLOW COOKER)     

Ingredients:

15-18 oz frozen hash brown potatoes (thawed)

12 eggs, beaten

1 cup milk

1 tablespoon ground mustard

1 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon pepper

3-4 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled

1 (12-oz) packaged shredded cheese

Directions:

1.     Spray the crock of a slow cooker with cooking spray. Spread hash browns to cover the bottom of the crock.

2.     Whisk eggs, milk, mustard, salt, and black pepper together in a bowl.

3.     Spread crumbled bacon over hash brown and spread cheese over bacon. Pour egg mixture over cheese.

4.     Cook for 6-8 hours on low or 3-4 hours on high.

(adapted from AllRecipes)

recipe on Nov. 18, 2017 blog

Breakfast Pull-Apart Bread

Sometimes there's not time for even the most simple and quickest yeast bread. Then we need a reliable recipe for a bread to take to a brunch or other gathering. This recipe fits the bill! Prep time of 15 minutes and cook time of 25 minutes and its ready to go. The ingredients are basic things you probably have, or can get ahead of time with a bit of planning. I think you'll enjoy this Breakfast bread. I took it to a family brunch a few weeks ago and it was a hit.

Breakfast Pull-Apart Bread    

Ingredients: 

6 slices bacon, diced small

1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter

1 tube of refrigerated Pillsbury Grands biscuits

3 large eggs, beaten

1/4 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1/4 cup shredded Monterey jack cheese

2 scallions, finely diced (optional)

Directions:

1.    Cook bacon in a large skillet over medium-high heat until crispy, stirring occasionally, about 5 minutes. Drain on a paper towel and set aside. (I cooked the bacon in the microwave oven on a paper towel)

2.    Preheat the oven to 350°F.

3.    Put the butter in a nonstick bundt pan coated with cooking spray and let it melt in the preheating oven.

4.    While the butter melts, cut the Grands biscuits into quarters. In a bowl, gently toss the biscuit pieces, bacon, eggs, both cheese, and scallions together.

5.    Once the butter has melted, give the bundt pan a little swirl so the bottom is evenly coated. Add the biscuit mixture to the pan, sprinkling with any cheese and bacon pieces that get left behind.

6.    Bake for 25-27 minutes or until golden.

7.    Run a dull knife around the edges of the pan to loose. Turn out on a dish and enjoy!