Easy Brunch Bake

I'm one of those full breakfast kinda gals.  I think Continental Breakfast is really more like a snack.  I'll take eggs and bacon and toast and potatoes over a danish or pastry any day.

Most days, I'm totally fine with making the works.  Some days, not so much.  So I came up with this egg bake that has everything in it that I love.  Spicy home fries, spam, eggs and sourdough bread, and let's not forget the cheeeeeeeese.  All this in one casserole.  Um, sign me up!  You can also make this ahead of time for a potluck or brunch party.  Or just on a Sunday morning to pig out on after a long weekend.

The beauty of this baked casserole is that you can pretty much use whatever you want in it.  If you don't like spam, use cubed ham or sausage. You could even use shredded chicken or no meat at all.  Bump up the veggies and make it a veggie egg bake with broccoli and asparagus.  YUM!  It's all good.

For this bake, I used:
spam
leftover baked potatoes
onion
serrano chili
eggs
cheese
milk
seasoning salt
black pepper
sourdough bread (you can use any kind of bread you want)

You can use cold, leftover home fries if you have any.  Or you can just make some up.  I made some for this recipe, but I usually have some on hand.  I make homefries in bulk and just keep in the fridge to eat during the week (I'm serious about being a full breakfast kind of gal).

For the homefries:

I sauteed one small onion in olive oil over medium heat.  I used a lot of Lawry's seasoning and black pepper.

I like my potatoes spicy so I chopped one serrano chili.  You don't have to.  I add to onions.

I chopped up some spam.  You can use ham, sausage, chicken, or a combo of any of these.

Saute together.

I had 5 small already baked potatoes that were left over from something else.

You can microwave them if you don't have already cooked potatoes.  OR you could use frozen shredded hash browns if you wanted.  That works too. 

I chopped and threw in with the onions, chili and spam.

At this point, I add a few tablespoons of water to help with coating the potatoes.  Adding water helps coat the potatoes with all the yummy seasoning without adding more oil.

Everything is already cooked at this point, so I just mix around until the water gets absorbed and it looks like this:

Set aside.

I grabbed 3 slices of sourdough bread.  I used this kind:

I love sourdough.  You can use white, wheat, rye, french, shepherds, whateva!

I used a knife to cut into even cubes.

I used a glass baking dish, this one was a 11x7x2 rectangular pan. Spray with non-stick spray like Pam.

Add your cubed bread.

Spoon home fries over the bread.

Add shredded cheese.  Or no cheese. Or lots of cheese.  I used sharp cheddar. Feel free to pick any cheese you want.  Or don't want.  Whatever.

I whipped up 5 eggs with some milk.  I know the pic has 3, but 2 had rolled out of the picture. 

 Little suckers.

I added black pepper.  No salt because my potatoes are well seasoned.

Whipped with a fork.  Or spoon.  Or chopsticks.  Whatever you work best with.

Pour egg mixture over your bread, potato, cheese mix.

I baked on 375 for 30 minutes.

And it looked like this when it came out.  Don't worry about the white.  That's just the egg.

Side profile.

Let it sit for about a minute before you cut and serve.  Grab yourself a corner piece....those are the best.

I should mention that you can use more eggs if you want.  I don't like my casserole to be that egg-y.  I like the egg to be just sort of be on the bottom with just enough to set the casserole.  But feel free to use a dozen eggs to make this more quiche like.

You can serve with fruit, but remember it's got everything in there so you don't need toast or anything like that.  Enjoy your egg bake!

You could also just assemble it and refrigerate it if you're making it ahead of time and bake it later when you're ready for it.

Here's one I made using left over ranch rolls for the bottom, ham instead of bacon, and mushrooms leeks sauted with frozen hash browns:

I shredded the ham and topped over the bread.  I chose to do that because the ham was thin sliced for sandwiches and frying it up in the veggies would just dry it out.

I chose to use mushrooms and leeks for this version and when they were nice and sauteed, I poured in frozen hash browns.

Pour 'em in and mix 'em up...

Here it is all layered up, pre-cheese and egg.

Here it is all done:

Ground Pork in Black Bean Sauce/Szechwan Style

Hey.  Did you know that there are different types of Chinese cuisine?  Panda Express doesn't count....

Szechwan style originated in the southwest part of China and its known for it's bold flavors and liberal use of garlic and chili.  Um, yes please.  It's no wonder that it's right up my alley.

I was at a Filipino market recently...I know we were just talking about Chinese food, hang in there.  I had never been before and I saw things I had never seen before.  It was fascinating.  There's always some cross mix of Asian items at Asian markets, like Japanese products in Korean markets and that kind of thing.  But any way, I stumbled upon this:

I had to have it!  I've seen it before, but for some reason, it inspired me so I adopted it and brought it home. Only I would be inspired to cook Chinese food while at a Filipino market...

Here's the simplest black bean dish you can make at home.  I used ground pork, but you can use chicken or beef or no meat at all.  You can just make stir fried veggies using this sauce.  It's salty and rich and makes a delicious stir fry.  You can also use whatever veggies you want.  I had originally thought I would use green beans, but I had this Korean squash that needed to be used up so opted to go that route.

Here's what I pulled out of my fridge for this concoction:

1/2 pound of ground pork

fresh, chopped garlic (as much or as little as you want)

I call this gang the aromatics....onion, ginger and dried red chilis 

(if you don't have dried red chilis, you can used crushed red pepper or none at all if you don't want spicy)

King trumpet mushrooms and Korean squash

(King trumpet mushrooms are really meaty when cooked.  You can use any kind you want or none at all.  This was also a fridge cleaning mission for me so I added the mushrooms)

and this bad boy, of course...

Grab some oil to start with too.  I just used olive oil. 

Normally when I cook, I just chop as I go along making sure to add the veggies or meats that need cooking longer first.  In Chinese cuisine, that doesn't really work because everything goes super fast....so I actually chop everything up first before I even turn the heat on.  Trust me....this is super fast.

I used a piece of ginger about the size of a really thick quarter.  Make sure you peel it first.

Then finely mince your ginger.

Here's a pic of the first line of defense...just kidding.  These are your aromatics.  I used about 1 heaping tablespoon of crushed garlic, 1 tablespoon of fresh chopped ginger and 6 dried chili peppers. (If you don't have these kinds of dried chili hanging around then feel free to use crushed red pepper..you know, the kind that come with pizza.)

I chopped up my onion, squash and mushrooms.  Here's what the inside of Korean squash looks like.  It's meaty and drier than other kinds of squash.  It soaks up flavor really well.

Here are my veggies.  All ready to go!

In a non-stick pan or well seasoned wok (if you have one) add about 2 tablespoons of oil (I used olive) on med high heat.

Throw in your aromatics.  The smell is immediately amazing.  Careful not to burn.

After a few seconds, I dumped in my ground pork.

When it becomes brown and crispy, add your veggies

Saute for a minute or so until your veggies are soft.  Then add a heaping spoonful of the black bean sauce.

I added about 1/4 cup of beef broth.  You can use water.  Again, I was on a fridge cleaning mission and had a little broth I needed to use up so I used broth.  

Hey, look!  I had a little bit of tofu I needed to use up so I threw it in as well.

And, darn.  I just like my food spicy so I threw in some chili sauce for good measure (but you don't have to).

I let it simmer for another minute and viola!  

If your sauce isn't as thick as you'd like it to be, just add a little cornstarch dissolved in water.

I ate this over rice, but its also good with noodles or even over a bed of fancy greens if you're cutting carbs.

Feel free to try broccoli, asparagus, carrots, or whatever veggies you have on hand. You can add peanuts too if you want.  Black bean sauce is like a miracle stir fry.

Here's a version I made with mushrooms,  bell peppers, celery,  cauliflower and onions with pork.   I also used less water to make it drier and added chopped water chestnuts.  I used it as filling for lettuce wraps.  YUM!

Impress your friends and family with your Szechwan cooking abilities!