Mommy Frittata

Do you know how cute it is to ask a 3 year old what he wants for dinner and hear him say "Frittata"? Like, every night? I didn't even know what the heck frittata was until I was almost 28!

August 17th, 2009 Jonas Henry Holden decided he was ready to come out and play. Since he was born at 3:57 AM, my first hospital meal was a breakfast. Now I would love to know who in their right mind thought that a sleepy mom who just had the workout of her life would want to have anything to do with a breakfast burrito. I decided I'd rather stay snuggled up with my baby and sleep. So it sat there until Jonas and I were all alone and I was finally hungry enough to give it a go. By then it was hard as a rock. :(

BUT ... breakfast the next morning made up for that cruel trick of the breakfast burrito. I'm not much of a breakfast gal. I'm not big on eggs. Sausage and bacon always seem like a bit much first thing in the morning. I do love me some fried taters, but other than that I tend to gravitate toward the sweeter breakfast items ... pancakes, french toast, bear claws, and I have been known to dive in to a chocolate cheesecake on occasion. But what that wonderful hospital staff brought me that morning was something completely different. I didn't even know anything like this existed! I was, of course starving, and this square of yumminess seemed like it was filling that hole in my stomach with everything I needed to bust out of that hospital and take over the world. ;)

I wasn't home long before I began pouring over frittata recipes to try and recreate it. I mashed a few recipes together and added the ingredients I wanted and this is what I came up with ...

Mommy Frittata

I've discovered all of these amounts are not set in stone. They can vary wildly and it'll still work out just fine.

7 Eggs

10 oz. Chopped Spinach

3/4 cup Grated Cheese (I think I use at least a 1/2 pound.)

8 oz. Sliced Mushrooms

1 Medium Chopped Onion

Salt, Pepper, Garlic (Pesto is yummy, too!)

1 Pkg. Bacon cut in bite-sized pieces

7 Tbsp Milk

Sometimes I put in Olives and Marinated Artichoke Hearts, too.

*Take all the bacon out of the package leaving it in a big brick. Plop it on a cutting board and start slicing through all of it to make bite-sized bacon pieces. I like to use peppered bacon, but regular is great, too.

*Chop that onion and make sure your mushrooms and spinach are ready to go, too.

*Throw all those little bacon squares in a BIG skillet and cook them on Med/High until the grease starts coming out of the bacon.

*Then pour in the onions, mushrooms, and spinach. Saute the whole bunch.

*In a big bowl beat together the eggs and milk. You can add your favorite spices in now, too. Don't forget the bacon will add some salt, though. (And pepper if you used peppered bacon.)

*Add the shredded cheese.

*Dump in that yummy stuff you sauteed on the stove (or whatever is left of it after everyone has snacked on it.)

*If you want to add in olives, artichokes, or anything else, now's the time.

*Grease a casserole dish with butter or olive oil, dump it all in, and bake at 375 for 30 minutes.

Doesn't that look yummy? It is! Sam loves it, Jonas loves it, I love it, but do you know who doesn't love it? My husband. You know, the one who eats ANYTHING? How, you may ask, could anyone NOT love what is basically a PIE filled with foods you love? Apparently that's the problem. He says when it's all together he can't enjoy all those ingredients individually. So I guess what I should do is just take a big scoop of the sauteed stuff out for him and scramble him some eggs on the side? I guess it's a good thing he's not as wild about it as the rest of us are because it's SO stinkin' easy to make I'm pretty sure we would make it 5 times a week with every imaginable combination of ingredients for variety. Pizza Frittata? Taco Frittata? Chicken and Broccoli Frittata? The possibilities are endless!

Oh - and see how it makes that crust around the edges? That's the BEST part.