A Recent Breakfast

Crepes filled with fruit and cream--so simple and so good. The crepes were made with eggs from my friend's chickens, we picked and froze the berries last summer, and the piima cream was cultured on my son's dresser above my kitchen.

I recently did a kitchen purge and got rid of my two nonstick skillets. The coating on the 12" Farberware one had started to peel, no doubt putting plastic bits into our bodies, so I wasn't sad to see it go. My lovely little blue Chantal skillet, on the other hand, still looked fine and was the best crepe pan ever. Once it left my kitchen I was a bit reluctant to make crepes but I found that Mark Bittman's recipe cooked up perfectly in an 8" stainless steel skillet.

It's true that crepes don't exactly make a quick and easy breakfast but they're absolutely worth the work, especially if you can share the cooking duties. And leftover better can be refrigerated for a quick snack later on.

Blueberry Breakfast Cake

I woke up the other morning with blueberry breakfast cake on my mind. It probably had something to do with the more than 20 pounds of blueberries the kids and I picked at a lovely farm out in Canby. However, much as I liked the sound of it, I've never actually had blueberry breakfast cake so I had to come up with something that would live up to the name.

This cake has all kinds of things to get your day off to a good start. Yes, it's filled with those super healthy fruits, but there are also lots of whole grains and nuts to fuel your day. Lemon zest and cinnamon accent the berries beautifully.

I hope you'll give this one a try. I think it's the new summer breakfast of choice around here.

Printable recipe

What's for Breakfast

I have this weird relationship with eggs. I think I can't stand them and if you put a plate of scrambled eggs or an omelette in front of me, chances are good I'll have to walk away. On the other hand, there have been a few well loved but rather bizarre egg dishes in my life proving that I don't hate eggs, I just can't deal with them in their simplest forms.

My dad used to poach eggs in milk and serve them over shredded wheat with lots of butter, salt, and pepper. This used to horrify my husband, but now he's a convert as there's nothing better on a cold morning.

In college I frequently made and ate a dish I called SPEGS (slimy potato egg stuff) which involved cracking an egg or two over home fries with cheese and onions and was absolutely delicious as long as the egg wasn't too cooked, hence the slimy part. I know...weird.

When I was pregnant with my second child, a neighbor kept us well supplied with fresh eggs. I mostly avoided them until it occurred to me to hard boil them and make them into into tacos topped with liberal dollops of Mrs. Renfro's green salsa. This I never converted my husband to--he remains horrified to this day. However I once ate a classic dish of hard boiled eggs wrapped in tortillas in Yucatan so I wasn't not completely off base though I imagine no self-respecting Yucateco would have touched my crazy pregnant version.

Lately, in my ongoing attempt to eat more protein, I'm hitting the eggs again. Eggs can give me the same problem that nearly all meats do. I'm not really opposed to eating either, but the smell of them cooking tends to leave me too nauseated to think about eating. Aren't I just about the craziest person ever?

Anyway, the trick for me is to hide the eggs as much as possible. Lately I've been making a big mess in a skillet that has so much happening it's hard to even notice the eggs. I think the original inspiration for this dish came from Joe Esparza who, in the early days of his very successful restaurant, would make migas for me and it was an astounding breakfast. There's a great post here that goes into the nuances of various torn tortilla dishes should you care to dig deeper. We just tend to call the dish tortilla eggs.

My quickie version is rarely the same from one time to the next though corn tortillas, eggs, chiles, and cheese are all required components. Sometimes I like it on the mild side but lately smoky ground chipotle is making me very happy. Late summer additions have included diced zucchini and corn kernels. Though no real recipe is required for a seat-of-your-pants dish like this, my best approximation is here.

This dish has so much going on that the eggs pretty well get lost for me but the explosion of flavors and textures is spectacular. I'm sure you'll find a way to make tortilla eggs your own.

Granola

About halfway through Passover I started craving granola which, being made of oats, is definitely on the forbidden list for the week. I tortured myself looking at recipes I couldn't make until Passover ended and finally purchased the needed ingredients yesterday. I still haven't switched my dishes, but by 9 o'clock last night I had a big batch of granola cooling on top of the stove.

I've made granola plenty of times and yet I 'm always delighted at how a good mix of ingredients and only the slightest effort produces something so much tastier than can be bought. I tried the recipe from Nigella Lawson's Feast which has gotten rave reviews all over the place and I wasn't disappointed. Yes, I know, there's an awful lot of Nigella around here what can I say? She 's never let me down.

Her granola recipe includes applesauce which seemed a little weird to me but I think it helps everything stick together without a frightful amount of oil and also softens the texture just enough that you don't fear cracking your teeth.
This batch was made with sliced almonds, cashews, pepitas, dried cherries and dried apricots. Yum. Surely you want to make some yourself. The recipe is here. Enjoy!

Apples

We went apple picking recently and came home with 37 pounds of Gravensteins from an orchard with the rather worrisome name of GM Farms. The bushel basket has been sitting in the kitchen where it's slowly being emptied by hungry kids . Before they all disappeared I wanted to make sure to make an apple pancake or two, just like my dad used to make for us. One of the things I always loved about this dish was the slightly salty crust that forms. I rarely buy salted butter, but it's what takes this dish right back to my childhood. The flavor is just like my father's version but we differ in technique. I saute the apples and cook the pancake in the same pan. He likes to preheat the pan in the oven, melting a stick of butter at the same time and sautee the apples separately on the stove. Then he puts the batter in the preheated pan and places the apples on top. I've done it both ways and haven't noticed much of a difference except my way uses less butter and saves the washing of a pan. Sorry, Daddy--I hate to be more efficient than you are!Another nice thing about this one: you probably always have the ingredients on hand so you can make up an apple pancake at a moment's notice. The recipe is here. Let me know how it goes.

Teeny Weeny Zucchini Muffins

Wasn't I just whining about the piddly zucchini output from my garden? It's funny how things change. A few tiny specimens have suddenly morphed into monsters. It's Attack of the Godzini around here these days. Happily the plants I chose at the grocery store are of a variety that can get large and remain fairly tasty without a bunch of tough seeds. I went out to do battle with the squash this morning and came back with enough for dozens upon dozens of tiny zucchini muffins.
Apart from babies and hedgehogs, I don't think I'm terribly susceptible to cute, so my fondness for the mini-muffin seems to make little sense. It isn't that they're petite and charming (though they are). I find it much easier to properly bake a mini-muffin than those of the standard sized variety. They cook all the way through and they seem nice and sturdy so no topless baked goods. They're a great size for picky kids who can take one bite and then turn up their noses at your lovely treats without wasting a full twelfth of the batter.
The recipe takes its inspiration from a few sources, but I think it's fair to call it my own. It's full of zucchini, of course, and also warm spices. No nuts to mess up the texture though you are welcome to toss them in your muffins if you like that sort of thing. And I should think you could make a dozen standard size muffins from the quantities given though you'll really want to watch the baking as the zucchini is very moist. Better yet, just make some mini-muffins and wallow in their spicy cuteness!

Rhubarb Coffee Cake

We always had rhubarb growing up. My dad had a few plants around and we always enjoyed his rhubarb pies as well as stewed rhubarb over anything: ice cream, shortcake, or (my favorite) tapioca pudding. I've always loved the jewel-like color and the tangy flavor of rhubarb despite the fact that for so many people it's either unknown or disliked intensely. I was delighted to find that none other than Nigella Lawson is a huge rhubarb fan and I took it as a good omen that our first home of our own included a vigorous rhubarb plant.
Not only did we snap up (and immediately eat) over a pound of the most delicious cherries at a Mt Vernon farm stand the other day, but I also spied a bunch of rhubarb going for a very reasonable price. Since our own rhubarb was mostly harvested weeks ago, I was happy to find more of the ruby stalks looking fresh and healthy and I brought home a few pounds with no particular plan.
Rhubarb was not immediately on my mind this morning as I got up early to prepare for making strawberry jam with my dear friend Laura (more on that later). Thinking that we needed something tasty to fortify ourselves before heading off to the wilds of south Gresham to buy our berries, I started dreaming of something along the lines of a rhubarb coffee cake. I did some online research and assembled something using bits and pieces of a number of different recipes. The result was quite tasty: hearty, tangy, and ever so pretty in a homely kind of way. If you'd like to give it a try, the recipe is here.

Fruity Bread Pudding

True to tradition, Parade Day dawned rainy and gloomy. We're not parade goers anyway, but while I lay in bed thinking of all the damp souls waiting for the fun to begin, I also started thinking about breakfast. A cool, early summer breakfast is a grand opportunity as far as I'm concerned. I can't think of how many recipes I've seen which look delicious but involve baking summer fruit. Baking. Summer. Fruit. You get the problem, right? Who wants to bake anything when it's hot?

One thing I love is a good bread pudding. We make them all the time, often using leftover challah. Mostly they are dense, eggy things, either a savory variety made with cheese or a rich chocolate variety. Today I wanted something lighter where the flavor of recently purchased blueberries and cherries would shine.

I started with this recipe, the first to pop up after I googled "blueberry bread pudding". It was a good starting point, but looked too sweet and too bland so I fiddled around a bit and made enough changes that I think I can fairly call this recipe my own. I cut back on the sugar, added cherries along with the blueberries, used more bread, replaced water with orange juice,and upped the lemon juice and butter accordingly.I even had the opportunity to put my grandmother's pastry tips to use for pitting the cherries after picking up the tip while browsing through a Martha Stewart magazine. Once I found the right size, it worked perfectly.

Served with a little half and half, this was delicious. If I were a bacon-eating person, I think that might be the perfect breakfast companion to this sweet bread pudding. I might try and remember to whip up some veggie sausage next time I serve this in the morning. But it would also be a delightful dessert along with freshly whipped cream. Do give it a try.