Baked Eggs w/ Spicy Tomato Stew

June 10, 2014

Hey friends! What a busy week here! I'm guest posting this week on Whole 30's recipe instagram! So exciting! So, that means I have to take pictures of my food. When I have decent pictures, that means I can share recipes on my blog! Woot woot! Slowly but surely I'll get back into this whole blogging world..

While doing Whole 30, you eat a TON of eggs. Everyday seems like eggs and sweet potatoes. Which is fine by me, I love a good sweet potato hash with a soft, runny yolk on top...Buttt, I guess it can get a little old by day 20 or so,  so I tried to think up another good method to have my eggs in the morning. I tried an egg with some tomato sauce early on, because tomatoes are a great fat burner and an excellent antioxidant, but I just felt like it was missing something. I needed some more substance, like a good tortilla to dip in it. Wellll, tortillas are no bueno on the Whole 30, so I needed to find a different way to add substance. I added a bunch of stuff to the tomato sauce, and made it a hearty, tomato stew. I topped my stew with an egg and and baked it.

This breakfast was super easy, I cooked the stew up in one pot the day before. In the morning I put the stew into oven-safe bowls, cracked my egg, and popped it in the oven. AND, I was able to get stuff done for 25 minutes while it baked. Bonus! And when it's done baking, it looks like it has melted cheese on it. Double bonus!

Baked Eggs with Spicy Tomato Stew 

makes 2 servings

1 whole tomato, diced

1 15oz can of tomato puree (remember to check the ingredients)

(you can swap the whole tomato, and tomato puree for a can of diced tomatoes if you'd prefer)

1 tablespoon of tomato paste

1 cup sweet potato, chopped

1/4 cup onion, diced

1 italian sausage link (Whole30 compliant, of course!)

1 cup kale, chopped

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon granulated garlic

1 tablespoon coconut/olive oil

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

2. Heat oil in pan over med-high heat. Add sweet potatoes, stir for 5 minutes. Add onion, sausage, and kale. Lower heat to medium-low and cover for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Uncover and add tomatoes, tomato paste, and tomato puree. Add seasonings and simmer for 5 more minutes. 

3. Transfer stew to oven safe bowls/ramekins. Crack egg on each and bake for 25 minutes or until the egg white is firm but the yolk is runny. 

Enjoy!

Blueberry Ricotta Muffins

Alright, I have this bad habit of taking pictures of the food-making process, but forgetting to take pictures of the finished product--which might just be the most important part. When I start the recipe I always say, "Okay, Rochelle...you need to take pictures before you eat this."...And then when I put whatever it may be in the oven, I repeat this again. Then, as I'm licking the final morsels of food off my plate, it's always, "Rochelle!! You forgot to take pictures before you ate it!" Apparently I'm hungry most of the time.

So in my iPhoto here, I have a batrillion (may not be a word?)pictures of different recipes, but no finished product...and the problem with me is that I rarely make the same thing twice, so the chances of me repeating just to get a finished product aren't looking up. Maybe I'll get around to a post some day of a bunch of recipes with unfinished pictures....We shall see..We shall see...

Okay, these here Blueberry Ricotta Muffins were my first ever attempt at muffins from home. I've made plenty of muffins at work, but there is definitely something different about making things in a teeny-tiny apartment kitchen compared to a big, fancy, industrial kitchen...I actually had to go out and buy a muffin pan because I didn't have one. I also bought a little dough-scooper (actually, an ice cream scooper--but who cares. It works.).

Let me just say that these muffins were delectable. The hubby and I aren't really big on sweets and baked goods...But we devoured these in a couple days. So moist and flavorful plus the pop of the fresh blueberries...yuummm. Introducing fabulous muffins, my new muffin tins, and my fancy little scooper.

Blueberry Ricotta Muffins (adapted from bakingbites.com)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup butter, melted

1 cup ricotta cheese

1/2 cup milk (lowfat is fine)

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon lemon zest

1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries (or raspberries, cranberries, mixed berries...any kind of berries, really.)

Preheat your oven to 350˚F. Line your muffin tin with paper liners.

In a medium bowl, mix melted butter, ricotta, milk, eggs, lemon zest and vanilla until smooth. In a separate bowl, mix together your dry ingredients (the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar.)

Mix your wet ingredients and dry ingredients until just combined...careful, you don't want to overmix this here. Then, fold in your delicious, washed blueberries (or other berries) :)

Scoop your batter...

Into your lined tins.

Bake them for 18-22 minutes, or until they pass the toothpick test. I brushed mine with a little egg to make them nice and shiny.

Let them cool a tad, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Refrigerate in an airtight container and they should stay moist for several days :)

Holy Moses, SOO busy.

We have been jam packed, full to the brim--with business. With school, work, weddings, dogs, and everything else in this life, summer clothes are now on clearance...which means summer is coming to an end.

I've been learning sooo much in school, and while I could impress you with my new fancy french terms, I'm just gonna show you how to make good ol' southern style biscuits and gravy. Paul and I aren't huge breakfast fans. Neither of us ever eat breakfast in the morning and neither of us are huge breakfast-for-dinner people. We have both recently discovered, however, that we share a love for biscuits and gravy--any day, any time. In college (the first time around) you could never, ever catch me up in time for breakfast (or class) during the week--but come Saturday brunch I could almost definitely be found in the dining room chowing on a HUGE plate of biscuits and gravy.

I've never really had any idea how to make gravy (this biscuits part doesn't seem so hard, especially when you're a fan of frozen bread/dough products) until last week at school when we started making sauces. I will now share with you, from my masterful, sauce-trained, culinary mind, step-by-step, picture-by-picture instructions on how to make some of the tastiest, most yummiest sausage gravy everrrr.

Start with the biscuits, get them baking.

Gather your sausage.

Throw it in a hot skillet, over med-high heat.

Mash it all up.

Keep on mashin'.

Until it gets nice and brown and yummy and golden and crispy. Drool.

Pull the sausage from the pan and set it aside, leaving the grease in the skillet.

I added butter to get a little more fat in the pan, my sausage didn't produce much grease. If you have greasy sausage, you may not need the butter. You'll need about 3 tablespoons of grease/fat.

Add 3 tablespoons on flour. We are now making a roux. (Oooh, fancy culinary term. A roux is fat and flour...a thickener..)

Whisk your flour into your grease until not clumpy (I don't have a non-wire-whisk...so I used a spatula...whatever works.)

I forgot to take pictures of a few steps...It gets a little hectic at this point. Slowly whisk in 3 cups of milk, then toss in the sausage. It will look a little thin, so let it sit for a bit to thicken...if it doesn't thicken up, mix more flour and melted butter then pour it in. (1 tablespoon of flour to 1 tablespoon of butter.)

Flavor with lots of salt and pepper (to taste.) (By the way, TT means "to taste"...not 2 tablespoons. People in my culinary lab did not know this.)

Tear open your biscuits and glop the gravy on top. Yum.

Drool.

If you like a recipe:

(This will make enough for about 6 biscuits)

6 biscuits

1 lb. ground sausage

3 cups of milk

3 tablespoons of flour

1 tablespoon of butter (you may need more or less depending on the fattiness of your sausage)

coarse salt

pepper

Brown sausage in medium skillet on med-high heat.

Remove sausage from skillet, leaving drippings in the pan.

Melt 1 tablespoon of butter into skillet.

Whisk 3 tablespoons of flour into melted fat until not lumpy.

Slowly add 3 cups of milk into skillet.

Add sausage into gravy.

Let thicken for 5-7 minutes, serve over biscuits.

(Again, if it doesn't get thick after this time--mix 1 tablespoon of melted butter and 1 tablespoon of flour, then pour into gravy and whisk until not clumpy. Let thicken again. Continue to do this until desired thickness is reached.)

The end.

Heaven on a plate.