Breakfast Casserole!

This month's Pot Luck at work had the theme of breakfast food, and I decided that I'd make my favorite breakfast casserole.  I've been making it since I was a fledgling cook back in the 90s, and it's always a hit with whomever gets to indulge!  I totally forgot to start it until after 9 last night, and Rick was wondering what I was doing because I had already made us dinner (quesadillas!).  It's really easy and minus the time that it has to cook, it's pretty quick to make.  You can also make it the night before and pop it in the oven.  

I had several requests for the recipe, and if anyone from work is stopping by, I want to say a quick hello!  I hope that you enjoy the blog!  

Here's the recipe

Breakfast Casserole

Ingredients 

1 pound bulk breakfast sausage

2 tablespoons all purpose flout

1 1/2 cups milk (you can use low-fat)

1/2 of a frozen shredded hash brown potatoes bag

3 green onions, chopped

1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese

Directions

Preheat oven to 350F. Spray a 8x8x2-inch glass baking dish with cooking spray. 

Cook sausage in a large skillet over medium-high heat until brown, breaking into small pieces with back of spoon. Mix in flour, then milk. Cook until mixture thickens and comes to boil, stirring occasionally, about 5 minutes.

Arrange potatoes in prepared dish. Layer with 1/2 of green onions, 1/2 of cup cheese, rest of green onions, sausage mixture and remaining cheese (you can add more cheese if you'd like).  Bake casserole for 45 minutes.  

Enjoy!

 

Pork chops and potatoes

Publix had pork chops on sale again this week so I decided to do the Parmesan and Sage Crusted Pork Chops again.  This time around, we cooked them in olive oil to get a nice golden-brown crunchy crust, and then we baked them in the oven at 475F for 20 minutes until they were cooked in a baking dish.  Unlike the last time we made this recipe, the pork chops were pretty thick so they needed the additional cooking time in the oven.  For the side, Rick wanted to do baked potatoes again, but I wanted to try something different.  I was searching on myrecipes.com and came across this recipe from Cooking Light for roasted potatoes.  I changed it a bit by using 5 cloves of minced garlic.  Another change that I made was with the fresh herbs.  Instead of using flat-leafed parsley only, I used a combination of fresh flat-leafed parsley, basil, and sage.  Because I didn't have one, I omitted the lemon rind from the original recipe.  Rick said that he wasn't a huge roasted potatoes fan, but we both really liked these. Here's what we did.

Garlic and Herb Roasted Potatoes

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 5 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1  tablespoon of olive oil
• 1 1/2  pounds of Yukon potatoes (about 4 cups), chopped into 1-2 inch cubes
• Cooking spray
• 1/2  teaspoon  sea salt
• 1/4  teaspoon  freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons of fresh flat leaf parsley, chopped
• 2 tablespoons of fresh sage, chopped
• 2 tablespoons of fresh basil, chopped

Directions

Preheat oven to 475°.

Combine garlic and oil in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook 2 minutes or until golden, stirring frequently. Remove garlic with a slotted spoon; set aside. Drizzle remaining oil evenly over potatoes in a large bowl, tossing well to coat. Arrange potatoes in a single layer on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake at 475° for 30 minutes or until potatoes are golden. Combine reserved garlic and herbs in a small bowl; sprinkle garlic mixture evenly over potatoes.

Enjoy!

Emeril to the Rescue

My original plan for dinner last night was to do this pork tenderloin recipe that I had found in my new Vera Bradley Cooking with Friends cookbook. Unfortunately, I hadn't paid close attention to the recipe, or I would have realized that I needed to let the pork tenderloin marinate for 24 hours before grilling. Rick and I decided that it would be the perfect meal for this weekend which left me wondering what I was going to do for dinner that night.

After several of the recipes that I wanted to do from the cookbook required long (ie 3 + hours) of marinating, I decided to go on foodnetwork.com to see if I could find something to do. I guess I had pork on the brain because I started looking for pork chop recipes. Rick is a big fan of pork chops, but we so rarely have them that I decided to make them for a change. The recipe that I found had a side dish of Cheese Potatoes Au Gratin which would kill two birds with one stone. I was drawn to the pork chop one because it allowed me to expand my pantry purchasing liquid crab and shrimp boil and Emeril's Bayou Blast. I've never purchased Emeril's Essence before, and I was out of Cajun seasoning so I thought I'd give it a try. It's a little bit more expensive than the larger containers of it, but I liked it. The pork chops did require some marinating time, but I shortened it to just shy of 2 hours, and they were still great! They were definitely a hit!

Emeril's Shake 'Em Up Pork Chops

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup dry white wine
• 1/4 cup plus 1/3 cup olive oil
• 2 teaspoons liquid concentrate crab and shrimp boil (recommended: Zatarain's)
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 3 cloves garlic, smashed
• 1 bay leaf
• 4 bone-in center-cut pork loin chops, about 12 ounces each
• 1 cup dry bread crumbs
• 1/2 cup masa harina
• 1 1/2 cups finely grated Parmesan
• 1 tablespoon Essence Bayou Blast
• 1/3 cup olive oil

Directions

In a large resealable plastic bag, combine the wine, 1/4 cup of the oil, the crab boil, pepper, cayenne, garlic, and bay leaf. Add the pork chops and marinate, refrigerated, turning occasionally, for 2 to 4 hours.

In a clean, large plastic bag, combine the bread crumbs, masa harina, Parmesan, and Essence. Shake to mix.

Remove the pork chops from the marinade and shake to remove any excess. One at a time, add the chops to the dry mixture and shake until evenly coated. Remove, place on a large plate, and refrigerate for 15 minutes.

In a large skillet or saute pan, heat the remaining 1/3 cup of oil over medium-high heat. Add the chops and cook until golden brown and cooked through, 5 to 6 minutes per side.

Remove from the pan and serve immediately on top of portions of the Cheesy Potatoes au Gratin

Cheesy Potatoes au Gratin

Ingredients
2 pounds Idaho potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
8 ounces Cheddar, grated
1 1/2 cups heavy cream

Directions
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Lightly grease a medium gratin dish with butter.

Cover the bottom of the pan with an overlapping layer of potatoes. Lightly season with salt and pepper and top with a sprinkling of cheese (about 2 tablespoons). Continue layering potatoes, seasoning, and cheese, ending with the remaining cheese on top. Pour the cream over the potatoes, pressing lightly with your hands to cover the potatoes with cream.

Cover with aluminum foil and bake until the cheese is absorbed into the potatoes and the potatoes are tender when pierced with a knife, about 50 minutes. Remove the foil and bake until the mixture is bubbly and the top is golden brown, about 10 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let rest 10 minutes before cutting into portions.

A simple classic

Being on break is nice albeit a wee bit boring. Rick laughs at the fact that I get bored so easily which is even more frequent since I quit smoking. Luckily, it gives me more time and more opportunties to spend evenings with Rick. I think it adds to the love-hate relationship with being in school. I miss the days (and nights) of last summer when things like tests and clinicals the next morning didn't stand in the way of our spending time together and not to mention how annoyingly stressed out I'm sure that I am during certain times of the semester. I love him even more for putting up with me.

All that being said, this week Food Lion had t-bone steaks on sale at a ridiculously good price. Rick's mom had given him this wonderful (but kinda stinky) dry rub for steaks a while back, and we were more than happy to break it out twice this week for nights on the grill. It is a mixture of two different types of rubs, and when I find out the brands, I will edit and add them here so everyone can enjoy it, too!!!

Earlier, I confessed my fear of gas grills, and this week, that fear became a reality. Nope, the grill didn't blow up on us, but a poof of flame did leave Rick's right arm with quite a few less arm hairs. I'm not sure what happened with it, but he survived, and I have, once again, become a little timid around the grill.

To go with the steaks, I decided to go with the perfect pairing...potatoes. I opted to do mashed potatoes both nights. Usually when I make mashed potatoes, I do them the way that my Grandmother Elliott did and add onions to them, top them with cheddar cheese, and then bake them. We call them Nanny's Mashed Potatoes. This week, however, I didn't feel like dealing with the onions so I went for traditional mashed potatoes. The key to making perfectly fluffy mashed potatoes is to use a hand-held mixer. I used to torture myself and use a potato masher, but it never gave me the consistency that I craved. I do, however, start out the the masher before using the mixer. I just think that it's easier to mix with the mixer that way. Another thing that I did this week was to add heavy cream....evil, I know! I had bought it to make tomato basil crab bisque, and I figured that I wouldn't miss a couple of tablespoons. I also added a little bit of low fat milk as well so that I wouldn't use as much of the heavy cream. They turned out wonderfully!! I apologize for not having pictures again, but trust me, it was great!!!