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Recipe Category: Breakfast

Poached Eggs

1 servings

Poached egg with a sprinkle of pepper. Runny yolk peeking out of a small slit. White background.

What’s so great about poached eggs? Well, for starters, they’re cooked in a way that yields an extremely delicate, round little package of eggy goodness.

Some folks say they taste better than other egg preparations because they’re cooked without flavor-changing oil or rapidly boiling water that can “wash away” some of the taste. And the whites are just firm enough to contain the decadent, oozy golden yolk. It’s not hard to poach eggs but doing it well can take a little practice.

Ingredients

1 large egg
1 Tbsp white wine vinegar
Pot of water
Little bit of olive oil

Directions

Bring a large pot of water to a boil, reduce heat to low.

Stir vinegar into water. Using a small glass bowl to cradle the egg, carefully place into the water, hesitating briefly with the bowl part-way in the water but also holding the egg in one place so it can set slightly in a more compact form. This way, if you’re just making one it’ll have a more compact shape, and if you’re making more, each egg will get space so it doesn’t connect to others.

Cook about 3 – 3 ½ minutes, removing egg with a slotted spoon. Dab on a paper towel to remove excess water and serve immediately.

If making poached eggs ahead of time, transfer to an ice bath to stop cooking. After a few minutes, remove/dab with paper towel and place on a plate with a bit of olive oil. Cover with plastic wrap so a dry skin doesn’t form on the eggs.

Repeat with as many eggs as you’d like. You can also cook simultaneously if the pot has enough space. Best not to overcrowd.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner

Bubble and Squeak Patties

6-8 servings

Fried potato patties with greens mixed in. Arranged on a white plate with red garnishes and a few green herbs. On dark brown wooden table.

Bubble and Squeak is a quintessential UK recipe for using up goodies from previous meals. The name likely comes from the sound the ingredients make when they’re being fried together in a pan. Be sure to use potatoes that are cooked to soft and somewhat lumpy goodness – so it makes good “glue” with a little fun texture element. If you start with super-creamy mashers, you’ll need a little flour to thicken things up.

Ingredients

1 Tbsp butter
4 slices bacon, chopped
1 onion, finely sliced
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 egg, beaten
15-20 cooked Brussels sprouts, sliced, or 2 cups shredded boiled cabbage or other chopped cooked greens
2 cups cold leftover mashed potato, or cold crushed boiled potatoes
Sallt/pepper to taste
4-8 Tbsp flour, if needed
¼ – ½ cup cooking oil
Optional: ¼ – ½ cup leftover shredded cheddar or Colby/Jack cheese

Directions

Melt butter in a non-stick pan and get it nice and hot. Add bacon, and as it begins to brown, add onion and garlic.

Next, add Brussels sprouts/shredded boiled cabbage/cooked greens and cook 5-6 minutes so everything colors slightly.

Remove everything from pan and add to a medium mixing bowl. Clean the pan.

Fold beaten egg into mashed potatoes. If potatoes are super creamy, sprinkle in a little flour to tighten everything up. Then, stirring gently but thoroughly, into bacon/veggies. Adjust salt/pepper to taste.

Prepare a small plate with several Tbsp flour for dredging. Break off a little of the mixture, roll into a ball and then roll that in the dredging flour. Press gently into a patty.

Place non-stick pan over burner set to medium-high heat. Add 2 Tbsp cooking oil to the pan. Once it heats up, do a “test fry,” where you cook just one patty to see if there’s enough flour to hold it together. Add more flour to mixture as needed, and once you’re happy with the results, divide the rest of the mixture into about 8 even balls and press into patties. Gently lay some of the patties in the pan, giving them plenty of space. You’ll get the best results if you don’t flip them often, as that might cause them to fall apart more easily. Cook on one side until they’re a nice brown color and flip them just once…a flexible silicone turner/spatula works best for this. Depending on how thick/thin you’ve pressed the patties, it may take up to 4-5 minutes on each side.

Refrigerate leftovers in a storage container with a lid. To reheat, place in 350° oven for 5-10 minutes or heated through.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, Sweets & Treats

Panipopo

24 servings

Shiny rows of rolls in a glass baking pan. Sitting on top of sweet coconut milk. Gray napkin underneath.

Panipopo hails from American Samoa. It’s a treat that’s so much more than the sum of its parts. Fluffy rolls are baked atop and soaked in sweet, velvety coconut cream.

This recipe is adapted from a wonderful family recipe posted on manaui.com: “Why Samoan panipopo is food for the soul.”

Ingredients

4 – 7 ¼ cups flour, divided
1 tsp salt
1 ¾ oz butter
1 cup plus 3 Tbsp sugar, divided
3 tsp active dry yeast
5 – 6 cups warm water, divided
1 can coconut cream (1 ¾ cups)

Directions

In a large bowl, combine salt and 4 cups flour. Rub in the butter until the flour feels “silky” and clumps a little. Make a well in the middle, add sugar.

To a small non-plastic bowl, add yeast and, very slowly, 1 cup of very warm water. Stir until yeast is dissolved, using fingers if you’d like to help the process along. Pour yeast-water into the well in the flour mixture – you should see yeast begin to bubble up as it contacts sugar.

Using a wooden spoon, fold flour into the liquid and mix everything together thoroughly. Add more warm water, 2-3 cups, until it becomes a thick batter that still jiggles a bit when you shake the bowl.

Cover bowl lightly with a clean towel or parchment paper. Leave in a warm, dry spot to rise for 2 hours. By then, the dough should have doubled in size with lots of holes in it. Spread 2 cups flour on a clean work surface and put the dough on top of it. Fold flour into dough and knead until it’s much less sticky and absorbed almost all the flour, about 5 minutes.

When dough is easier to hold but still a little sticky, and a lot more solid than batter, put back in bowl and cover again for a second rise—about an hour. By that time, dough should have doubled in size and have more holes, but less than last time.

Add ½ cup flour to your clean work surface and knead dough until it’s less sticky. Cut dough into palm-sized pieces and roll into spheres on the work surface.

Preheat oven to 400°. Place buns in neat rows in a 9” x 13” baking pan, they’ll keep rising while you prepare the coconut cream sauce.

Pour coconut cream into a bowl. To the empty can, add 2 Tbsp flour and some warm water to stir into the flour until you have a thick liquid. Add more warm water until the can is full, pour the water-flour mixture into the coconut cream. Stirring continuously, add in 1 more cup of warm water and then 1 cup sugar.

Set aside 1 cup of coconut cream sauce and pour the rest into the pan with the buns. Put pan into oven, with a sheet pan one rack down to catch any drips, and bake 20 minutes. Check buns at this point, the sauce should have cooked down a bit. Add the reserved cup of coconut cream sauce and bake 20-25 minutes more.

Buns should now be golden on top with coconut cream sauce bubbling around the bottom. Remove pan from oven, covering with foil so buns don’t dry out as they cool. Serve warm.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner

Frittata

4-6 servings

The ratio of eggs to half and half (or cream) and cheese will give you the delightful richness you’re looking for.

Whatever you’ve got on hand that doesn’t have a lot of water content can make great add-ins, like carrots, greens, beans – even some leftover cooked pasta – but maybe not tomatoes.

Just make sure the egg/cream/cheese combo covers your goodies and there isn’t too much watery liquid left over from the pre-cooking – strain ‘em if need be.

Ingredients

2 Tbsp olive oil
½ lb tiny potatoes, sliced thinly
½ cup ham, diced
1 ½ cups fresh spinach, cut into ribbons
2 green onions, sliced
1 clove garlic, finely minced
Generous pinches salt and pepper, to taste
Pinch smoked paprika
¼ tsp garlic powder
¼ tsp onion powder
½ tsp Dijon mustard
8 eggs
¼ cup half and half or heavy cream
¾ cup shredded cheese, divided

Directions

Preheat oven to 400°. Butter a standard loaf pan (glass is best but whatever you’ve got).

Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add potatoes, 2 Tbsp water and a generous pinch each of salt and pepper. Cover/cook about 12-15 minutes, until softened. Drain any excess water from the skillet and stir in garlic, ham, spinach and green onions. Cook until spinach is wilted and garlic fragrant. Place add-ins in prepared loaf pan and spread out evenly.

In medium bowl, whisk together eggs, half and half, Dijon and dry seasonings. Fold in ½ cup of the shredded cheese. Pour over add-ins and top with remaining cheese. Cover with foil and bake until eggs are set, about 15-20 minutes, more as needed. Once eggs are set, remove foil and broil about 2 minutes for a crispy top. Cool for about 5 minutes before serving to make sure eggs are set.

Go with a combo of the cheese you have on hand. Leftovers to use: steamed broccoli, grilled veggies, cooked pasta, roasted squash.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, Vegan

Dutch Oven Boule

Round bread loaf sitting in a red Dutch oven pan. Parchment paper between bread and pan. White-painted wood grain surface behind.

A boule is simply a round bread, but it elevates it dramatically when you add it to your culinary lexicon, along with some garlic or herbed compound butter for slathering.

Let the bread cool completely before slicing to truly enjoy the flavor and allow for proper slicing. Use a serrated knife, gently but deliberately “saw” back and forth in long strokes across the bread to create the pieces, rather than the “press and wiggle” technique, which will leave you with a smushed slice.

Pro tip #1: Baking by weight will produce a more consistent result. We highly recommend investing in a scale when doing any bread or pastry making.

Pro tip #2: Using metric measurements allows for much easier scaling up or down. No need to try to do math gymnastics with ounces and pounds!

Ingredients

3 cups (345 g) bread flour, plus more for shaping
1 Tbsp salt
1 ¼ tsp active dry yeast
1 ½ cups warm water

Directions

Whisk together bread flour, salt and yeast until combined. Pour in warm water and stir until you have a shaggy, sticky dough. Cover the bowl with a damp kitchen towel and set in a warm spot until dough doubles in size —2 to 6 hours.

Punch down dough. Shape into a ball, twisting the dough around on the countertop with your palms (the bottom of the dough stays in place). Place dough on a piece of parchment paper with a bit of flour on it. Cover with damp kitchen towel again.

Heat oven to 450°. Put a 6-quart Dutch oven with cover in the oven and allow it to heat up while the oven preheats.

Allow the dough to rest and rise for 30 minutes. At this point you may score the top layer of your dough using a lame or very sharp paring knife. Carefully remove hot! Dutch oven lid and place dough with parchment underneath in Dutch oven and close lid. Bake for 45 minutes. Remove lid and bake for another 10-15 minutes until the crust is golden brown and the bread sounds hollow when you tap it with a spoon.

Remove from oven and let cool at least one hour.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, Vegan

Open-Faced Koji Pâté Sandwich with Olives and Caramelized Onions

4-8 servings

Fresh koji, plant-based pate on ciabatta bread with roasted onions and olives on wooden table

Koji is a variety of molds – Aspergillus oryzae – that are used in fermentation and are safe to eat. It contains about fifty enzymes that break down starches in grains such as rice into sugars and makes these sugars available for yeasts to consume in the fermentation process. The use of koji dates to the 8^th century, and it’s a vital ingredient in many traditional Japanese products such as pickles, sake, soy sauce and miso. If you’ve ever eaten any of these things, you’ve enjoyed the transformative process of koji.

The folks at Prime Roots have developed meat alternatives using koji, and the results are tasty and satisfying. BriarPatch carries their pâté products – Harvest and Black Truffle. Here’s a simple recipe using pâté that’s a great way to see what the Prime Roots version is all about.

Ingredients

8 slices crusty artisan bread
1 cup pitted green olives (we like Frescatrano or Castelventrano)
3 Tbsp olive oil, plus more for drizzling
1 bay leaf
2 large yellow onions, halved/sliced
¼ tsp sea salt
2 6 oz tubs Prime Roots Koji pâté
Fresh thyme sprigs, for garnish

Directions

Heat oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add onions and bay leaf and stir/cook for 5 minutes until starting to soften. Add salt, reduce heat to medium low and cook for 50-80 minutes or until onions are very soft, golden brown and caramelized. Stir every few minutes as you go. Timing will depend on your type of pan, size of onions and heat of your stove.

If onions start to stick to the pan, reduce heat to low. To speed things up after 50 minutes, turn heat higher for more caramelization and stir continuously to prevent burning. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly. Discard bay leaf.

Slice bread, drizzle with a generous amount of olive oil and lightly toast in the oven on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper.

Remove bread from oven and spread each surface with pâté. Top each slice with caramelized onions, olives and thyme sprigs.