Recipe Time: OK, I Actually *Liked* This Breakfast

Hi all! I hope you are doing well.  I've been MIA for longer than usual, I know. I've been sick - not in-the-hospital-sick, but pretty sick and only in the last few days have I felt well enough to power up the laptop and write. Being sick really sucks, but being sick in the summertime is the worst, especially since the a/c in our house is less than stellar. So during the truly hot miserable days, it's even a bigger challenge when you don't feel well. 

OK, obligatory whining and self-pity done. 😉

Moving on, I have a really wonderful recipe to share with you, for a breakfast dish. Breakfast, generally speaking, is probably my least favorite meal, unless we are going out to breakfast, or someone else is fixing it. Don't get me wrong, I eat breakfast every day, I know how important it is. During the week, it's usually cereal or yogurt and fruit (oatmeal in the winter), or sometimes I get crazy and have toast. My favorite "quick" breakfast is a pastry or doughnuts, but even I know those are best enjoyed few and far between.

The Tim, now - there's another story. Yes, sometimes he just has toast or something basic, but 4 out of 5 mornings during the week, he'll actually make himself a breakfast that involves cooking.

But here's one of the main differences between us - he loves eggs, in any form. Whereas, I like eggs well enough, but they are just not a fave of mine. And we have a longstanding agreement that on weekends, unless we are heading out for some running around, etc., or traveling, that I fix Saturday breakfast and he fixes Sunday breakfast. Which is fair, but a lot of times I struggle with what to fix. Since I'm not a huge fan of eggs, I'm not the best egg-cooker. I'm good at scrambled eggs, and I rock soft-boiled eggs, though I *really* don't like them. (Anytime it involves soft yolks, I'm out!)

As you can imagine, The Tim makes really wonderful weekend breakfasts, with a lot of variety. I have my moments, but ... meh. At least most of the time.

So a few weeks ago, I was really tired of my few tried-and-true breakfast dishes. I decided to poke around for a new idea, and I found this recipe. It had a lot of things going for it: relatively quick, easy to put together, and containing ingredients we generally have on hand. 

Et, voila!, as the French say:

Bonus: it smelled wonderful while it was baking!

I made our breakfast sausage (veggie, of course) separately, rather than put it in the casserole, but I can see how that would be yummy as an ingredient. Along with some fresh cherries, it was a breakfast success!

I highly recommend this recipe if you want to try something different - and if you are someone who likes breakfast for dinner, it would work for that as well!

I made enough for four servings, and we had the other two servings heated up later in the week, and that worked really well.

I didn't have enough tater tots to use them on the bottom and on the top of the casserole, so I only put them on the top. I used fresh herbs and onions, instead of dried ones, and threw in a red pepper that was close to its expiration date with us. I can see that you could have a lot of fun adding other things to this, depending on what is in your fridge or garden.

It was really delicious, and I had to laugh when I realized it was a Gordon Ramsay recipe, because he's not someone I go out of my way to follow or watch. But he gets a thumbs up for this recipe!

Let me know if you give it a try, and if you like it. It's a definite addition to  my (admittedly limited) breakfast repertoire.