Cousin Betsy's Green Chile Breakfast Casserole

The first time I tasted this recipe, we had spent the night at a cousin's house that we were visiting. The next morning as we sipped our coffee, this pre-prepped casserole was simply put in the oven and before long we had a tasty and satisfying breakfast that filled us for our long drive home. While we enjoyed the recipe, what struck me more was the practical simplicity of her making this the day before and simply sticking it in the oven on Sunday morning as her guests were waking up and getting dressed. The work of preparing the breakfast dish was invisible to us since it was done before our arrival. 

It was the perfect reminder (as the home cook) of the beauty of having some "make ahead" simple recipes so that the cook doesn't have to stress and can interact more with the guests.

This recipe is hardly unique nor is it a creation of mine. And it doesn't have to be a "breakfast casserole." It could be served for a brunch or even a dinner or lunch. 

You can easily search the title below and find an endless number of variations. The ingredients are simple and are made up of items that can easily be found in supermarkets across the country. I followed my cousin's recipe but I also tried some of the variations out there on the Web (including the cottage cheese version!). I blended her recipe with a few others to create this version. I've made it a number of times and the results are consistent. But, this is another recipe that you can tweak to make something that's just "yours." 

Oh, and don't buy the bags of pre-shredded cheese. Buy a block and shred it yourself at home. The bags of pre-shredded cheese are treated with an additive to prevent it from clumping. This additive causes the cheese to not melt the same as cheese you shred at home. For this recipe, the melted cheese topping is essential. Plus, whole cheese is less expensive by weight. 

Green Chile Egg Breakfast Casserole

Ingredients:

• Eggs - 8
• Green chopped chiles - 7 oz., drained (or try two 4 oz. cans for a bit more spice)
• Monterey Jack cheese - 6 oz., grated
• Sharp Cheddar cheese - 8 oz., grated
• Milk - 1/2 cup
• Flour - 2 Tbsp.
• Baking soda - 1 Tbsp.
• Garlic salt - 1/2 tsp.
• Black pepper - 1/2 tsp.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spray some non-stick oil in an 11 x 7 rectangular baking dish.
3. Sprinkle a thin layer of the cheeses on the bottom of the baking dish. Use more of the jack cheese but include some cheddar. 
4. Evenly cover the cheeses with the green chiles. 
5. 
   In a large bowl, add the flour. Using a whisk, add a tiny bit of the milk and whisk it into a paste. Slowly, add more milk and continue to whisk. The goal is break up any clumps of flour. Whisking constantly, slowly add in the rest of the milk. 
6. One at a time, break the egg into the same bowl and whisk each one to mix them up before adding the next egg. Continue until all eggs are in and mixed.
7. Add the baking soda, black pepper, and garlic salt. Whisk to combine.
8. Pour the egg mixture into the casserole covering all of the cheese and chiles.
9. 
   Sprinkle the top with the remaining cheeses (heavier on the cheddar) and bake in the middle rack for 30-35 minutes. If this is prepped the night before and kept overnight in the refrigerator, increase cooking time to 40-45 minutes. You want to look for a topping of golden cheese that is ever so slightly browned on top.
10. Remove from the oven and let sit for at least 5 minutes.  

You can serve this with salsa, sour cream, or a hot sauce like Tabasco or Crystal on the table and let each person decide what they want to add, if anything. Leftovers can be refrigerated and reheated and will last about four or five days.

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Egg Salad with Capers, Dill, and Lemon

The eggs salad sandwich brings back childhood memories. If you grew up in the 60s, this was probably part of your school lunch or a simple dinner from time to time. Likely served on Wonder bread to boot. Although every mother may have had her twist on the recipe, I am certain all of our childhood egg salads were more alike than unique. The allure of egg salad continues to this day. If you search of egg salad on the internet, you will find that nearly every one of them has the word "classic" in the title as if it would be unheard of the vary egg salad or try something new. 

I have a few paper notebooks where I tape recipes from magazines or newspapers that look interesting to me. I was looking through them trying to find some simple meals I could make for a friend going through chemo and radiation. This recipe caught my eye and I decided to give it a trial run. 

While waiting for the eggs to cool after hard boiling them, I was trying to decide how to chop the eggs. The recipe suggested using a potato masher but I don't have one of those. So I decided to use the wooden bowl and knife set I got as a Christmas present. The set is from Holland Bowl Mill out of Holland, Michigan and they make high quality wooden bowls and they also have the Mezzaluna knife. The bowl features the chopping knife designed to work right in the bowl. The idea is that you can chop your green salad right in the salad bowl. In addition to salads, it turned out to that the bowl and the scalloped knife was the perfect way to chop the eggs. 

This recipe still has a lot of same ingredients as the classic egg salad but it does have some new twists.

Egg Salad with Capers, Dill, and Lemon

Ingredients:

• Mayonnaise - 1/2 cup
• Capers - 4 tbsp. rinsed and chopped
• Dijon mustard - 4 tsp.
• Dill - 4 tsp. fresh chopped
• Lemon zest - from 1 medium to large lemon
• Eggs - 8 hard cooked, peeled and chopped
• Radishes - 2-4 thinly sliced
• 
  Romaine lettuce leaves - 4 washed, dried, and cut to fit
• Buns - 4 high quality buns (ciabatta, brioche, etc.)
• Salt - start with a generous pinch 
• Black pepper - 1/2 tsp. 

Instructions:

• Hard boil eggs and let cool.
• In a medium bowl whisk together mayonnaise, capers, mustard, dill, and lemon zest.
• In a separate bowl, coarsely chop eggs.
• Thinly slice radishes.
• Add chopped eggs to mayonnaise mixture and stir to mix. Add black pepper and salt to taste. 
• Cut buns in half and place cut side up on a cookie sheet. Broil in an oven until lightly toasted. 
• Spread some egg salad mixture on the bottom layer bun. Top with sliced radishes and lettuce. Top with more egg salad and add the top bun.
• Serves 4

Hard Steamed Eggs

Hard boiled eggs make for a tasty and a relatively healthy snack. But what if the way you've been preparing hard boiled eggs for all these years was not the best way? We have made the eggs the traditional way--the way our mother's taught us--with boiling water.

Not too long ago, while attending a dinner party where one of the dishes contained a good number of sliced hard eggs in a green salad. The creator of the dish said that he had done some online research and found that it's actually a better practice to hard steam them, which is what he did.

If you research the topic online, you will find a variety of approaches for hard eggs. The most common is to submerge the eggs in water, bring it to a full boil, and then remove from the fire, cover the pan, and let the eggs cook for 10-12 minutes. But sometimes an egg will crack and some of the yolk oozes out creating what looks to be a deformity.

Then you'll find camps that swear that a pressure cooker works best. You will find suggestions that involve baking eggs in an oven. Then, there are whole discussions about the age and temperature of the egg and how that impacts results. There is a lot of thoughts and words online for such a simple thing. But the result that everyone is striving for is a hard-cooked egg that is easy to peel and does not crack during preparation.

So using some of the links below, I gave it a try. Add an inch or so of water to the pan. You don't want water coming over the base of the steaming basket. Over the water, place the steaming basket and add your eggs. Turn on the heat and bring to a boil. Bringing one inch of water takes way less time than the traditional way (saving you on the energy bill). Once boiling, turn down heat, if needed, but keep a boil going. Cover and set a timer for 12 minutes.

At the 10 minute mark, prepare an ice bath. In a large bowl create a mix of water and ice cubes.

After 12 minutes, remove the cover, and take the pot off of the heat. Using tongs, transfer the eggs to the ice bath and let it rest there for 10 minutes. When it's time, use the tongs to remove the eggs and let them dry on a towel.

The result? Same tasty egg as the traditional way, but much easier to peel. No more losing chunks or layers of eggs.

Next, I wondered if I could use an appliance steamer. I have a Black and Decker steamer. Because the eggs are further from boiling water and there's more steam escaping, you need to go 25-30 minutes.

Here are a few resources on the subject:

Fresh Eggs Daily - Shows you how to use the bamboo steamer.

Instructables - Step-by-step guide with photos. Lots of comments to add ideas.

Serious Eats - This person really went to town experimenting with a variety of factors.

Give it a try!

Breakfast from the Box

Something cool occurred to me as I was making our Sunday breakfast: I knew the source of just about every ingredient. Most of it came from our weekly CSA box but for those that didn't I knew where it came from. Here's how it went.

I began by cutting up a couple of fingerling potatoes and sweet potatoes (leftover from last week's box). I got them started in the skillet with some butter, black pepper, and a dash of salt.

Then I decided to go for a Southwestern egg scramble given the ingredients in this week's box. I started by dicing half of a yellow onion (from the box) and got it started in a skillet with some EVOO. While the onion cooked down, I diced half of a green bell pepper (from the latest delivery) and added it to the skillet. Four eggs (from a friend's backyard chickens) were whisked together along with some of Penzey's Southwest seasoning and into the skillet they went. I chopped up some cilantro leaves (from the box) and added them into the eggs. A diced avocado (finally ripened from last week's box) got added and then some grated cheddar cheese (OK, this was from Trader Joe's).

Oranges and tangerines (from this week and last) were juiced.

After plating, I sprinkled some dried parsley (from the backyard) over the potatoes and served.

All in all, an enjoyable locavore breakfast.

Lemon Pancakes

Sunday is egg day. We always have eggs for breakfast on Sunday. But as we approached this last Sunday I noticed that we only had three eggs left. One short of our usual pair of two-egg omelettes. What to do?!? 

 I remembered a memorable breakfast that was served to us when we spent a weekend at our friend's house near Chicago. They made us a wonderful pancake breakfast one morning. We're normally not big pancake fans but these were unique, fluffy, and flavorful. Fortunately, I got the recipe and it called for three eggs. A plan was falling into place! A Saturday afternoon trip to the store provided any missing ingredients. 

  Lemon Pancakes 

Ingredients:

• 3 eggs, separated
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup cottage cheese
• 1/2 stick melted butter
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon lemon zest (just do the zest of 1 small to medium lemon)
• raspberry or maple syrup

Preparation:

• Preheat the oven to 250 degrees
• Separate the eggs into two bowls
• Beat the egg whites until they hold stiff peaks
• Add flour, cottage cheese, butter, sugar, salt, and lemon zest to the egg yolks
• Beat the mixture until well mixed
• With a large spatula, fold the egg whites into the yolk mixture
• Stir until they are well mixed with no clumps of white or yellow
• Heat a griddle or skillet over medium heat
• Grease lightly and spoon 2-3 tablespoons of batter for each pancake
• Cook slowly for about 90 seconds to two minutes and then flip and cook on the other side for 60 seconds
• Keep the pancakes warm in the oven until ready to serve

Serve with warmed raspberry or maple syrup and powdered sugar on top. The original recipe calls for some berries on top of the pancakes. I added a ripe banana this time just because it needed to be eaten. Any good fruit will work. Use what you have on hand. It will all be good. Oh, and those are Morningstar veggie sausages.