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.

Hashbrown Casserole

Happy Easter ( x 2!!)


This year I hosted an informal brunch for our family.  The holidays are always so hectic for everyone, it's nice to offer a relaxed, come-whenever-you-can, no-pressure option.  After all, it's a holiday!  What good is a holiday if you're so busy running around every place that you can't enjoy it and relax a bit?

That being said, I wanted to make some brunchy, hearty food that I could offer my family when they stopped by.  The trick is keeping it warm; because to me, there's nothing better than a hot breakfast/brunch to remind you to slow down and savor a holiday.  I already had a breakfast casserole planned with eggs and sausage-- the obvious compliment to it would have to include potatoes. 

Say it with me: "MMmmmmm..... carbs........ "

I have had breakfast-potatoey goodness at other family functions, but never grabbed a recipe for them.  After making a mental note to be more aggressive about getting recipes from friends and family members, I went to allrecipes.com and found the one I wanted to use.  As usual, I paused to consider whether or not I really wanted to try a new recipe for company-- but then I figured it was potatoes, cheese, butter, onions, and sour cream-- how bad could it be?? 

Source:  allrecipes.com (with my modifications and commentary)

Ingredients:

1  2-pound bag of frozen hashbrown potatoes, thawed-- (For those of you who are "details people," the amount on the bag actually says 1 LB. 14 OZ, so don't let that throw you off)

1/2 c. melted butter

1 can of condensed cream of chicken soup

8 oz. sour cream

1/2 c. chopped onions-- (And for those of you who hate to measure veggies, like me, this ended up being a little less than half of an onion.  I measured this time, since it was for company, but I'm quite sure I won't measure in the future.  Because I hate measuring chopped/sliced/minced veggies.)

2 c. shredded cheddar cheese

1 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. black pepper

2 c. crushed cornflake cereal

1/4 c. melted butter

Directions:

**I ended up making this the day before, then baking it the day of the event.  These directions are slightly different than the original recipe instructions.**

Day Before

1.  Make sure your hashbrown potatoes are nice and thawed. In a large bowl, combine everything except for the last 2 ingredients.  (those will be combined and added right before it goes in the oven.)  If you're like me, and not afraid to get your hands dirty, go ahead and mix it by hand.  This was MUCH more effective than mixing with a spoon.  But be careful, it'll be cold!!

2.  Place potato mixture in a  2 1/2 - 3 quart casserole dish.  Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Day Of

1.  Preheat the oven for 350 degrees. 

While the oven is preheating, take out the potato mixture so the dish has a chance to warm up a bit before going directly into the oven.  I know some bakeware is designed to go straight from the fridge to the oven, but I'm neurotic about breaking dishes, so I do everything I can NOT to :))

2.  To make the topping, melt 1/4 c. butter in a microwavable bowl.  Meanwhile, crush the cornflake topping in a separate bowl.  Combine the butter and cornflakes, then add to the top of the potato mixture.

3.  Bake for 40-60 minutes (uncovered), or till cooked throughout. 

The original recipe calls for 40 minutes of baking time, but I felt like it wasn't hot enough throughout, so I kept placing it back in the oven)

Verdict: 

The Mr. declared this a keeper, and I happen to agree.  I think the guests that had several helpings of this dish would agree, too.  

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.

Banana Bread

Guess what?? My Mom surprised me with a fantastic birthday gift.... she bought me my KitchenAid stand mixer!!!!  YYEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!


So guess what I've been doing lately?  That's right.  Baking.  I have baked more in the last 3 weeks than I have baked in the last three years. 

Now that the rush of Christmas is over (and I failed to photograph the cheesecakes I made) I decided it was time to blog my first baked good.  There were several over-ripe bananas in the house, so it just made sense to attempt my first homemade banana bread.

Again, forgive the horrible photograph-- the photos will continue to be crappy till I ask for my next self-indulgent gift... a badass camera NOT attached to a cell phone :)

Ingredients:

2 c. flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 c. butter

1 c. sugar

3 RIIIIIIIIIIPE bananas, mashed

2 eggs, beaten

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 c. milk (I use skim because that's what we drink)

cinnamon (enough to cover the top of the batter surface... I didn't measure :))

nutmeg (not as much as the cinnamon-- maybe about half the amount?)


Directions:

Preheat oven to 325 F. 

Grease and flour a loaf pan.  (Don't forget to grease the sides, too!)

Mix together the flour, baking soda, and salt in a bowl and set aside. (Don't mix in the sugar like I did the first time... I had to throw out a whole lotta flour, baking soda, salt, and sugar because I mixed them all together and shouldn't have.  That'll teach me to rush through directions.  Well, maybe.)

Cream together the butter and sugar.  (I didn't soften the butter, but the next time I make this I will in order for the "creaming" process to go more smoothly).

Add the mashed bananas, eggs, and vanilla to the sugar and butter mixture. 

Add the flour/baking soda/salt mixture-- do this a little at a time.  Trust me, you'll thank me later :)

Last, add the milk, cinnamon, and nutmeg. 

Beat together till well-blended.  Pour batter into pan and bake for at least an hour.  Depending on how "done" you like your banana bread, start checking it after an hour.  Personally, I like a little bit of a crust on my bread, so my total baking time was about 1 hour and 10 minutes. 

Remove from oven and let cool in the pan for 10-15 minutes. 

Remove from pan and set on cooling rack to finish cooling. 

... or, if you're like me, slice off a piece when it's cool enough to hold in your hands. Yuuuummmmmy!

Verdict:  KEEPER!