Category: Breakfast

Breakfast items including main dishes and side dishes

November 28, 2016

How to make the absolutely BEST Bacon

Serving Dish of Baked Bacon

When it comes to making bacon pan frying seems the obvious choice. Or perhaps microwaving bacon comes to mind. But, maybe you’d be surprised, but the best bacon is … baked in your oven.

Maybe you might think ‘Baking Bacon?’. Really, though it’s simple to do, there is no mess and while the bacon is cooking, your stove top is free for other uses. The best part about baked bacon is the final result is a very presentable flat strip of bacon.

The first step is to line a cookie sheet with a piece of parchment paper. Then lay the bacon on the paper. The paper will make clean up a jiffy and the bacon won’t stick to it.

Bacon on half-sheet pan lined with parchment paper

Toss that pan into a pre-heated 400 degree F oven. Bake for about 15 minutes, checking at 10 minutes just in case. Should look like this at 15 minutes:

Bacon In Oven at 15 minutes

We let that cook for a couple minutes longer, and removed from oven. The final product on the half-sheet pan looked like this:

Final cooked Bacon on half-sheet pan

July 13, 2016

Baked Crepes For Breakfast This Weekend

Baked Crepe or a Pancake?

Often breakfast is the same old boring meal. Cereal, fried eggs, or toast; again and again. So here is something completely different. It’s a weekend meal, we think, as it takes about 20 minutes to prepare. Honestly, it’s not that much work. Mostly waiting for the baking to complete during which time you can be doing other things.

We’re calling it a Crepe. Maybe it’s a pancake.

1/3 cup flour
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tbsp butter
Confectioners sugar
Lemon juice

Preheat oven to a moderately hot 425° F.
Meanwhile place the flour, milk, eggs, and nutmeg in a bowl and mix well but not too well. Like for pancakes, leave some lumps. They’ll go away.
Use the butter to oil a non-stick oven proof 9″ frying pan or other round pan.
Pour batter into the pan, this is like a pancake so should be a 1/4″ or 3/8″ thick (9mm give or take) place in oven and bake for about 15 minutes. Check at about 12 minutes to see how it’s cooking. Cook until the pancake is set, lightly browned – see picture above.
Remove from oven. Dust with sugar and dash with lemon juice; serve.
Makes 2 portions.

March 11, 2012

Gravy and Biscuits Breakfast Meal

Gravy and Biscuits for Breakfast

This is a classic southern breakfast meal. Because sausage is high in fat and cholesterol, it’s best made with a low fat sausage. The one we use is a locally made Kirby and Holloway Sausage which is always lower in fat when compared to the big name brands. You can just tell when cooking it because there is almost no fat in the pan after cooking.

To start this recipe, cook 1 pound of bulk sausage in a non stick skillet. Keep breaking the sausage up into smaller and smaller pieces as you turn and cook it. When the sausage is half way cooked add 1/4 cup of finely chopped onions.

When the sausage is cooked through, sprinkle 3 tbsp of flour over the top of the sausage. Mix in well. Add 2 cups of milk. Stir.

Cook over medium heat, while stirring often, until the milk mixture thickens and is bubbly.

Serve over freshly baked biscuits or as we do, over toast points. Picture of the final serving is at the top.

Finished Gravy and Biscuits in pan

Toast Points

Author: Matthew Schroebel

January 8, 2012

Classic French Toast

French Toast with Strawberry Jam and Maple Syrup

Looking to have something different for breakfast other than the standard eggs, potatoes and ham/sausage, today we had French Toast. This is a fairly simple breakfast that can be made from start to finish in about 10 minutes. What you need:

2 eggs
1/2 cup low fat milk
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
McCormick Cinnamon Sugar (or 2 tsp Cinnamon blended with 1/3 cup confectioners sugar)
4 slices bread (we used whole wheat)
Strawberry Jam or Strawberry Jelly (as a garnish)

Beat the eggs in a bowl that is wide enough for the bread to fit across, but not to wide as you want the bread to soak up the liquid. Add the milk, and pure vanilla extract. Beat together well. Heat a large frying pan or griddle over medium heat and melt a small tab of butter in the pan or griddle.

Dip one piece of bread in the egg/milk mixture, quickly turn over and dip the other side. If you have a cookie rack handy, place the rank over a dinner plate, a place the dipped bread on top of the rack to allow any excess egg/milk mixture to dip off. Repeat for the other 3 slices of bread.

Brown the bread in the pan or griddle, and flip to brown the other side. You want to make sure to toast the bread will so that the egg is completely cooked (i.e. the finished French Toast should be firm and not damp). Place a tablespoon of Strawberry jam or jelly on the plate as a garnish and to dip the toast in when eating. I like to cut my French Toast up into about 3/4″ square pieces as I eat it.

Sprinkle the Cinnamon Sugar over top of the Toasted French Toast finally pour over a little warm Maple Syrup. Serve alone or with bacon, ham, or sausage as you desire.

Makes 2 servings, 2 slices each.

Alternatives:
Use 1/4 tsp Imitation Rum Extract in place of Pure Vanilla Extract.
Cut 1″ thick slices of bread from a whole loaf, cook thoroughly, and use 1 slice per serving.

McCormick Cinnamon Sugar

Author: Matthew Schroebel

January 4, 2012

Creamed Chipped Beef Breakfast Recipe

Serving of Creamed Chipped Beef Recipe

This is tasty breakfast meal and is often known as SOS. It’s easy to make, and tastes great. On the downside, chipped beef is high in sodium. Don’t salt this dish.

Ingredients:

6 Ounces Chipped Beef
2 tbsp butter
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped red or green bell pepper
1/4 cup flour
2 cups milk
Paprika as a garnish

Package of Esskay Chipped Beef

Directions

Shred the chipped beef into about 3/4″ wide pieces
Melt the butter in a non-stick skillet
Cooked the onions and pepper until there is a light carmelization (browning) of the onions
Sprinkle the flour over top and cook for another minute or two, stirring the mixture.
Add the milk, and beef. Cook over medium heat, while stirring constantly until the mixture thickens.
Meanwhile make 4 siles of toast and dice.
Serve over diced toast pieces. Sprinkle with Paprika to add additional color.

Creamed Chipped Beef In Pan

Author: Matthew Schroebel

September 26, 2009

Dill Omelet Recipe

Dill omelets are a favorite in Southeast Asia. While this omelet might look a little bit different to the Westerner, we assure you it tastes simply delicious.

3 eggs
1 tsp fish sauce* (from Asian Grocer)
Pinch of Lawry’s Seasoned Pepper
2 tbsp chopped fresh dill (or 1 tsp dried dill weed)
1 spring onion (aka scallion), diced

Whisk the eggs well with a hand whisk until light and frothy. Add the fish sauce, Lawry’s Seasoned Pepper, and dill. Mix together well.

Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Stir fry the spring onion for 1/2 minute. Add eggs, and using the bottom of a fork swirl the eggs around until they start to set. Then let cook until firm and push to one side of pan to form omelet.

Note that this is a French style omelet and light and fluffy unlike the typical American style omelet that is cook firm and then stuffed with a filling. The trick to getting this omelet cooked just right is to have the pan medium hot and the mix the eggs around with the fork until just about set, and then simply pushing the eggs to the side of the pan. It’s not hard to do but might take one or two times for you to get the knack of the French omelet cooking method.

*If you don’t happen to have fish sauce in your pantry you can omit it completely or substitute 1 tsp grated Parmesan cheese from to umami flavor it imparts. If you’ve never cooked with fish sauce and are interested in trying this recipe as directed, don’t be concerned about the smell of the fish sauce. It completely disappears in the food and gives the omelet a delicious flavor.

Author: Matthew Schroebel

August 8, 2009

Peppery Hash Brown Breakfast Potatoes

Hash Brown Potatoes with Jalepeno Dices

This is a great twist from the standard hash brown potatoes which are either plain potatoes or are mixed with some onions. Our Peppery Hash Brown Potatoes add some diced Jalepeno Peppers and are quite simple to make.

1/2 package simply potaoes
1/2 medium onion diced
1 jalepeno pepper, diced (no seeds — only the green part, this is breakfast!)
1 tbsp McCormick Santa Fe Seasoning

In a medium greased skillet, add shredded potatoes, onion, and pepper. Cover and cook over medium heat for 4 to 5 minutes. Toss. Cook covered for another 3 to 4 minutes. Serve with eggs and your favorite meat such as sausage as shown below:

August 4, 2009

Delicious Buttermilk Pancakes Recipe with Vanilla Extract

We’re on a breakfast theme for a few days. Today we’re making Buttermilk Pancakes with Vanilla Extract served with pure Maple Syrup. These are absolutely delicious, light and fluffy pancakes. This is absolutely delicious.

1 cup flour
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
1 cup 2% buttermilk
3 tbsp melted butter
1 tsp Pure Vanilla Extract

Oil your griddle and start heating it over medium heat. In a small cereal bowl, beat the egg. In a medium size bowl, mix the beaten egg with buttermilk, then add the flour, sugar, and baking powder. Add the Pure Vanilla Extract, mix in. Beat in the melted butter. Don’t worry about mixing the batter so muxh to mix in all of the flour. The lumps will work themselves out in the cooking.

Test your griddle for readiness by dropping a drop of water on top. It should sizzle and dance around if the griddle is hot enough.

Once ready, pour or ladle the batter onto the griddle. Be careful to take your time and not pour out too much batter — if you do you’ll have giant pancakes. Your looking for a nice 4 -6″ pancake.

Cook the pancakes until they bubble on top. If this is your first pancake experience, then left up a side and peak underneath the pancake. If brown, then flip the pancake over and cook the other side. Otherwise wait 20 seconds or so and peak again.

Serve with Pure Maple Syrup. I like to add an over-easy egg between the layers of pancakes and soak up the yolk with the pancake.

Author: Matthew Schroebel

April 14, 2007

How to make a low fat homemade breakfast sausage

We like to have breakfast sausage every once in a while. Yet often the brands at the grocer are laden with fat. We do know of

one brand

that is fairly lean, but most store bought sausage is very fatty. It seems the manufacturers often can resist the tendency to want to use up the fat and make something off it. Often you hear that the fat is required for the taste. We haven’t found that to be the case at all, and make our own sausage using store bought ground pork.

Sometimes we find a nice looking pork butt roast, remove as much fat as possible and then grind it up ourselves in our meat grinder. This is a great way of really making sure the butcher isn’t trying to make something off their fat just like the sausage manufacturers do! If you don’t have a meat grind though, you can ask your butcher to trim off the fat before grinding the pork butt, and tell them you’ll pay for the fat on the side. Personally, I like being in control of the grinding and making absolutely sure I can get rid of as much fat as I can. An honest butcher will do as you ask and make you a nice lean ground pork.

We happen to have a sausage stuffer too and sometimes make stuffed breakfast sausage. It’s a lot of work to stuff your own sausage and yet it’s rewarding since you know what’s in the sausage isn’t loaded with fat. This article is about make homemade sausage patties so we’ll reserve the discussion on making sausage links for a future article.

We started our homemade breakfast patty sausage using store bought ground pork. According to the nutrition facts on the pork, the amount of fat per 1/4 pound of ground pork is 22g which is 34% of the daily value. Readers might think that value is high, but that amount is for a 4 ounce serving. The typical fat content of packaged breakfast sausage is 22g per 2 oz serving, so the fat in our homemade pork sausage is about half of the fat in prepared sausage. The proof of this is in the picture above of our sausage cooking in the skillet. Take a look closely and you’ll see that there is no excess fat around the sausage. Keep in mind too, that we’re using store bought ground pork and the butcher just can’t resist the opportunity to get $4.00 a pound for fat. If we ground our own pork, and removed all of the visible fat then we could easily have cut the fat in half again.

What you need to make homemade sausage patties
1 to 1 1/4 pounds lean ground pork
1 tbsp very finely diced onion
1/4 tsp ground white pepper
2 tbsp parsley flakes
1 tsp ground sage
1/4 tsp chervil
1/4 tsp marjoram
1/4 tsp savory
1 tbsp water

Place all of the ingredients in a large bowl and mix well with your hands. Form into 5 to 10 patties depending on your preference. Cook over medium low heat in an ungreased non-stick skillet until browned, turn and brown the other side.

Make sure to notice how little fat is left in the pan when you’re done cooking these patties.

February 11, 2007

Soft Boiled Eggs with Toast Cubes Recipe

Breakfast time continues here in our Cooking Ideas sections with an Old Fashioned recipe for soft boiled eggs on toast cubes. Nowadays, you don’t hear or see soft boiled eggs around much. But they’re yet another way to add variety to your morning breakfast meal. You can buy special holders to place the soft boiled egg in and eat the cooked eggs right out of the shell along with toasted bread, or you can try this our way.

This is really an easy breakfast to make and it starts by heating a pot of water to boiling. Leave room in the pot to allow for the number of eggs you’re going to add. Allow 2 eggs per serving, and 2 slices of bread per serving. When the water reaches a roaring boil, add the eggs to the pan one at a time by placing the eggs on a tablespoon and lowering the egg into the water. When all of the eggs are in the pan, set a timer for 4 and 1/2 minutes. It won’t matter if any of the shells crack because the eggs will be peeled and chopped up.

While the eggs are cooking, make the toast, lightly butter and cut the toasted bread into about 1 inch cubes. You can cut two slices of bread at a time if you’re using a serrated bread knife. If you’re making more then 2 servings, you should start making the toast while you’re waiting for the water to boil. Place the cubed toast into a cereal sized boil.

When the timer rings, carry the pot of water to the sink, and add cold water from the faucet until the water is cool, then drain the water from the pan, leaving the eggs in the pan. Carefully remove the shells from the eggs, trying not to break the egg white or else the yolk will leak out. If the eggs are too hot to handle, cool them a little by placing the egg on a tablespoon and running cool tap water over the egg for 5 or 10 seconds. The way I peel the eggs is to use a small teaspoon to lightly tap on end of the egg until the shell cracks, and then carefully remove the cracked pieces of shell. If you’re lucky, when you have half of the shell peeled off the egg, the egg will pop out of the other half. If not, hold the half peeled egg over the bowl of toast cubes, and use a small teaspoon (one smaller then the egg shell) to scoop the egg out of the shell onto the toast. Repeat for the other egg, and then chop the eggs into about 3/8″ pieces and mix up the toast so that the yolk is distributed evenly. Sprinkle lightly with salt and serve immediately.