Asparagus, Chicken Apple Sausage and Gruyere Frittata

I may be taking liberties with the concept of a frittata. The consistency of this baked egg dish is very similar--light and fluffy, but it is not fried or flipped. And it has potatoes, much like a Tortilla Espanola. Whatever I decide to call it there's no doubt this combination of vibrant, earthy roasted asparagus, melty and nutty gruyere and slightly sweet, incredibly flavorful chicken apple sausage is a winner. If you're searching for new ways with asparagus, I highly recommend this. There were two reasons to use chicken apple sausage: the first is because it goes really well with the other flavors and the second because the South Bay Area loves themselves some chicken apple sausage. My husband and I have never seen a breakfast place in the bay area that did not offer a chicken apple sausage item on their menu. So, to honor my new (ish) home I used their favorite sausage.

Asparagus, Chicken Apple Sausage and Gruyere Frittata

Makes one 9 x 9" frittata

4 eggs
2 egg yolks
1 cup half n half or 1/2 cup each milk and heavy cream
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
10 stalks roasted asparagus*, chopped into 1" pieces
2 chicken apple sausages, sliced into about 1 centimeter pieces
3 ounces gruyere cheese, mostly grated**
2 medium yukon gold potatoes, sliced the thickness of kettle potato chips

1. Preheat oven to 400. Toss potato slices with olive oil to coat and season with salt and pepper. Arrange on a baking sheet in a single layer. Roast until tender, about 15 minutes. Set aside to cool.
2. (optional) in a medium saucepan over medium heat, brown sliced sausages in olive oil and set aside to cool.
3. Mix egg batter: whisk together the eggs and egg yolks, then add half n half (or milk & cream), asparagus, gruyere (in both forms) and sausages. Add salt and pepper to taste.
4. Lower oven heat to 350 and grease your baking dish. Lay potato slices three layers thick across the bottom of your baking dish. Pour in egg batter.
5. Bake for 30 minutes, or until the top begins to brown. Lower the heat to 275 and cook for an additional 20 minutes, or until a fork inserted in center comes out clean. Serve alongside a simply dressed salad.



*To roast asparagus, toss whole spears (trimmed of fibrous ends) to coat in olive oil and season with salt and pepper; bake in a single 375 degree oven until tender, about 12-15 minutes, depending on stalk thickness

**To prepare the cheese to mix into the egg batter first use a vegetable parer to shave 10 or so pieces from your hunk of gruyere, then grate the rest

I hope you enjoy this recipe and I welcome your feedback!

Greek Style Frittata with Lamb Shawarma Crumbles and Fire Roasted Tomato Ketchup

A month or more ago I started crafting a menu for a Springtime brunch I haven't yet had time to realize (and clearly won't, this year, as spring is over). On the brunch menu I'd planned the protein as an egg scramble (where the fire roasted tomatoes would be part of the scramble instead of pureed as a ketchup and to be accompanied by roasted spiced red potatoes and a sweet rice pudding with pistachios and rosewater), but while I was visiting my family in New York I was persuaded by my good friend to try this recipe as both a quiche and a frittata. In my opinion it worked best as the latter dish, and in fact this recipe turned out the most perfect looking frittata I've ever made, so that's how I've decided to present it, even though I've recently shared a frittata recipe. Instead of being served alongisde, the potatoes now form a crust at the bottom and lovely rendered lamb fat from the crumbles mixes well with the eggs and light cream in the filling and makes for a smooth consistency. The shawarma spices in the fat served to unify the dish. Oh, and the cayenne spiced fire roasted tomato ketchup with smoked paprika and fresh greek oregano wasn't bad, either. You'll need a grill to fire roast your tomatoes and if you have one pop the tomatoes on after a good dinner to prep the next day's breakfast; trust me, this is best done ahead of time and a good way to take advantage of the hot coals after a good barbeque.

Fire Roasted Tomato Ketchup

Makes roughly 1 cup

6 medium vine ripe tomatoes, halved, de-spined and de-seeded
>1 Teasp Olive Oil
1/2 Teasp. Smoked Paprika (the kind that's sweet, not spicy)
1/4 Teasp. cayenne
1 Teasp. honey
1 1/2 Tblsp apple cider vinegar
4 sprigs' worth of fresh greek oregano leaves, minced (after you've washed them, pass through gently pinched fingers to strip leaves)
Salt, to taste
Fresh Ground Black Pepper, to taste

1. Brush tomatoes all over with olive oil, then sprinkle with salt and pepper.
2. Roast tomatoes on gril until the outside is the slightest bit charred and the tomatoes get soft. Remove from heat and slide skins off.
3. Puree the tomatoes, then add the spices, honey and vinegar.
4. Cool, then cover and allow flavors to marry in refrigerator at least one hour and up to overnight. Serve with Greek Style Frittata, or another Greek themed egg dish.

Greek Style Frittata with Lamb Shawarma Crumbles and Feta



5 Large baby red potatoes, scrubbed and sliced about 1/8" thick with a mandoline
8 Oz. marinated artichoke hearts*, chopped coarsely
8 Oz. fresh baby spinach, washed
2 Tblsp extra virgin olive oil
2 Cloves garlic, minced or pressed
1/4 lb. ground organic lamb with a decent fat ratio
4 cloves completely crushed
1/4 Teasp cinnamon
1/8 Teasp freshly ground nutmeg
1/8 Teasp cayenne
4 oz. Feta cheese, crumbled (or more, to taste) - the best feta you can find
1/2 Tblsp butter
8 cage free, organic eggs
1/4 cup organic, hormone free half n half
salt, to taste
black pepper, freshly ground, to taste

1. Preheat oven to 375. Grease frittata baking dish and lay a crust of potatoes across the bottom of the dish (like a cheesecake crust), 4 or more layers of potatoes deep. When you can't see the bottom of the baking dish anymore add one full layer of potato slices over that. Put into oven as soon as it reaches the proper temperature. It should be cooked enough to add the frittata filling
2. In a pan over medium heat, melt butter and add 1/2 Tblsp olive oil. Add cinnamon, nutmeg, cayenne, salt and pepper to butter and cook for 5 minutes to infuse butter with spices. Add lamb and break up into small crumbles. Cook until browned. Pour into a bowl to cool, making sure to include every drop of fat from the pan (trust me!)
3. Using a little olive oil and a small sprinkling of garlic at a time, sautee the spinach over medium heat in small batches** until all of it is cooked. Set aside to cool.
4. Beat eggs with a little salt and fresh pepper and mix in half and half. Add crumbled feta and chopped artichoke hearts. When they've cooled, add lamb crumbles and spinach. Mix to thoroughly combine all ingredients.
5. When the potato crust is starting to be tender when pierced with a fork, remove from oven and add filling.
6. Return frittata to oven and cook for another 25 to 30 minutes, or until eggs are just cooked through. Serve with fire roasted Greek style ketchup.


*I tried the recipe with fresh, fire roasted artichokes, and the version with marinated artichoke hearts was far superior.

**Sauteeing the spinach in small batches will help keep the spinach from leaking too much water, meaning they're not only more tender and fresh-tasting, they also don't add nearly as much of that yucky green spinach water to your dish. Tip courtesy of my absolutely amazing co-chef, Szelin, who is too modest about her cooking abilities, and without whom I could never have pulled off not only the quiche and frittata, but the ketchup as well! ^_^

Spring Vegetable Frittata

I don't give my mother enough credit. In listing my inspirations for cooking and culinary adventures, I often talk about all of the different cuisines I've tried, the recipes I've consulted and the blogs I follow, but I don't talk about my first inspiration: my mother. When I was growing up we had a home cooked meal practically every evening and a hot breakfast every saturday and sunday. Even so, I don't have many memories of my mother slaving over a hot stove or laboring for hours to bake desserts--not to say we didn't have lots of delicious, homemade baked goods in our pantry--she just made it look that easy. My mother is a whirlwind in the kitchen and a champion improviser. She was also the first person to ever bring me into the kitchen and teach me the art and science of cooking. I wanted to feature one of her recipes for Mother's Day, but my mother hardly ever made the same dish twice (except for her amazingly delicious vegetarian cream of soups featuring fair trade wild rice, which deserve their own special category). Sure she had a few standard tried-and-true knockout dishes that she went to time and again when her fridge wasn't full of seasonal veggies, but when she had a fridge full of fresh, organic produce she would often throw together a quick, delicious stir fry, or a scrumptious frittata. It was in this spirit that I threw together my spring vegetable frittata with spring onion chevre and roasted asparagus. My mother loves redskin potatoes, so I chose them as the base/crust of this frittata. If you'd rather have a pastry crust this makes a great quiche. In the spirit of my mother's endless culinary creativity and ability to make a delicious dish out of virtually any ingredients, I encourage you to look at this recipe as a jumping off point. Don't get me wrong, it's super tasty as is (and something I'd have been proud to serve my Mom, had we been able to spend Mother's Day together, but we live on opposite sides of the country; sad) and I'd recommend trying it at least once this time of year. Roasting the asparagus gave the dish an extra dimension of flavor, as did carmelizing the shallots in sherry. But the real flavors of spring were captured by the green onion chevre, which I made a couple of hours ahead of time by adding the sliced-thin white parts of a few green onions to a softened log of goats milk cheese and allowing the flavors to marry by chillIng it, covered in plastic wrap, in my fridge for a couple of hours. Serve it alongside French style peas (simmered in chicken stock with mint and escarole or lettuce), or a butter lettuce and pea shoot salad dressed in something citrus-y. Whatever you serve it with, enjoy it with your mother. Or at least call her.

A quick note on what didn't work: I thought I'd managed to move with my 9" spring form pan, but I was mistaken, so I used a stove-to-oven 10" stainless steel saucepan; because of the extra space the egg was spread too thin for my liking. If you have a larger pan I'd suggest using more eggs. Or just use something the rough size of a pie tin.

Also, get a mandoline if you can and just use it carefully. I purchased mine for 17 bucks plus s & h and it made my potato slices delightfully uniform.

Spring Vegetable Frittata

Green onion chevre
(Make ahead of time, if possible, and let chill in the fridge)
3 - 4 green onions (also called scallions or spring onions), white and light green parts sliced thin, dark green tops discarded
1 log of goat's milk chevre (8 oz), softened

1. Combine all ingredients and allow to chill in the fridge up to 4 hours, wrapped in plastic wrap.

Frittata

5 medium sized baby redskin potatoes (also called new potatoes), sliced potato chip thin, about 1/8" thick (use your mandoline if you've got one)
1 bunch asparagus (optional: pre roast asparagus at 425 for 15 or so minutes, until the sugars begin to visibly caramelize); approx 1 dz spears, fibrous ends snapped off and sliced into 1/2" slices
4 oz. Green onion chevre
6 eggs
3 Tbl milk
1/2 Tbl butter
1 Tbl (total) extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 Teas. Cooking sherry
2 small shallot cloves, diced finely

1. Preheat oven to 425; grease baking dish and arrange potato slices in bottom of dish 3 or more layers thick (trust me, even if you can't see the bottom you'll end up with empty spaces in between because the potatoes shrink in the oven).
2. Roast the potato crust in the oven for about 15 minutes (it's ready for filling when the potato slices are soft enough to be easily pierced with a fork).
3. While the potatoes are roasting, caramelize shallots: in a separate pan over medium to medium high heat, melt butter (with a few drops of olive oil drizzled in to prevent the butter from burning) and add diced shallots. Stir and cook for 5 or so minutes, until shallots start to become translucent. Add sherry and cook, stirring every 1 to 2 minutes, until caramelized (brown or burnt looking areas start to appear on your diced shallots, indicating that the sugars are starting to gather). Cool shallots and meanwhile:
4. Whisk together eggs and milk. Add salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Add sliced asparagus and cooled caramelized shallots and stir to combine.
5. Allow potato crust to cool for a few minutes (so you don't cook your egg filling the minute you pour it in). Turn oven down to 350.
6. When potatoes/baking dish are cooled sufficiently top with egg/asparagus/shallot mixture.
7. Using a teaspoon, drop 1/2 teas dollops of green onion chevre into the egg mixture. Spread the dollops out as evenly as possible.
8. Put (now) assembled frittata in the oven and cook until set (approx 15 or so minutes). Serve with your chosen side and enjoy.

I hope you enjoy this recipe and I welcome your feedback.