Hashbrown Egg Bake

So... a couple of Saturdays ago, The Mr. and I woke up from a long night of fun and debauchery... and on such mornings, I crave a breakfast with some carbs.  Potatoes, to be specific. Since we normally don't include potatoes in our weekend morning breakfast routine, I didn't have a go-to recipe to satisfy my Carb-needs.

Enter Allrecipes.com. 

Have I told you how much I love allrecipes.com?  This may sound dramatic, but this website is the main reason I originally started cooking.  If you create an account with them, you can have a "Daily Dish" emailed to you once a day.  If it sounds good, you can print it or save it in an online recipe box; if it doesn't sound good, just delete it.  Before I knew it, I had a great variety of recipes at my fingertips-- all of which seemed simple enough for a novice cook like me.  

Back to Saturday morning.  I needed a recipe that involved eggs, bacon, and potatoes.  So I went to allrecipes.com, performed a search with those ingredients, and found this Hashbrown Egg Bake. Since it was just the two of us, I cut the recipe in half, which ended up yielding the perfect amount for us. The recipe listed here, however, listed the original amounts. 

Source: Allrecipes.com  


Ingredients:


1 (30 oz.) pkg. frozen hashbrown potatoes, thawed


1 lbs. bacon, cooked, drained, and crumbled


1 c. shredded cheddar, divided


1/4 tsp. salt


2 c. milk


8 eggs


pepper, to taste


paprika, to taste


1/4 tsp.




Directions:


1.  In a large bowl, combine hashbrowns, bacon, 1/2 c. cheese, and salt.  Spoon the mixture into a greased 9x13 baking dish. 


2.  Beat milk and eggs together in a large bowl. Add pepper.  Pour mixture over hashbrowns.  Sprinkle with paprika. 


3.  Bake at 350 for 45 minutes, or till golden.  Remove from oven, and add remaining cheese.

Verdict: Keeper!

Bonus-- it kept well till Sunday morning, so we reheated leftovers and had an easy, but deliciously satisfying breakfast.

Breakfast Casserole

Happy Easter!

This year, I learned a few things:

1.  There is no greater joy than having family and friends in your home.

2.  If one of those family or friends catch you photographing the food on the table (because you forgot to do it earlier), be prepared to tell them all about your food blogging adventures.

3.  No matter how hard you try, there simply is no way to make egg and sausage casserole look good in a photograph!
(It's a good thing it tastes like the breakfast of heaven on a plate, because it's not very photogenic :))

My love affair with this dish began several months ago when a colleague brought a breakfast dish to an early-morning faculty meeting.  It was one of those meetings where nobody wanted to be there, but it was required in order to finish a job.  To ease our suffering, one of my fellow teachers volunteered to bring a breakfast casserole.

It was warm, and meaty, and cheesy, bready, and flavorful, and oh-so-good.  This dish opened my eyes to a whole new world of breakfast delight.

Of course, I asked my colleague how she made it, to which she replied with a semi-complete list of ingredients.  "Oh, there's eggs, sausage, ground mustard, crescent rolls..."

Ugh, what a tease.

But it's all good, because I love a good scavenger hunt.  Taking this list, I went to allrecipes.com and found this recipe after doing a search of ingredients.  It was close, but it didn't have the crust that I coveted.  So I decided to omit the bread cubes from the allrecipes.com version, and line the dish with the crescent roll dough instead. 

It worked!

Now, anytime I have an opportunity to host a breakfast/brunch event (or bring a dish to a similar event) this breakfast casserole has become my go-to contribution.

Source:  My colleague + allrecipes.com

Ingredients:

1 lb. pork sausage--I prefer to use the Bob Evans brand, it's well worth the money!
6 eggs
2 c. milk
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. ground mustard
1 c. shredded cheddar cheese
2 cans of crescent rolls (refrigerated dough)

 Directions:

In a skillet over medium heat, brown the sausage. Remove from heat, drain, and crumble. Set aside.

 In a medium bowl, beat the eggs. Add milk, salt, ground mustard, and cheese and mix well. Set aside.

In a 9"x13" baking dish, unroll the crescent roll dough. Line the bottom and sides of the dish. You may need to stretch and pinch the dough to get it to cooperate fully.


Add sausage to the baking dish and distribute evenly. Then, pour the egg mixture over the sausage. Refrigerate overnight (or for at least 8 hours)


When ready to bake, set the oven to 350 degrees and bake for 40 minutes (or till desired doneness) . Enjoy!

Verdict: 
It's a hit!  My guests gobbled it up, and I had requests to take some home.  Plus, it keeps well for a couple of days in the fridge.