Category: Breakfast

Scones made with Yogurt

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Image shows a plate with 8 triangular scones on a tray .


I baked these scones made with yogurt twice on vacation because they were so good. Our dear friends David and Hollie asked for the recipe, so here you go!

The original recipe is from Tara Omidvar on The Spruce Eats, with a couple of tweaks: upped the yogurt from 3/4 of a cup to 7/8 of a cup and made it into two rounds of dough, since we like slightly smaller scones.

I also made our favorite fresh raspberry jam since it is so easy and they were both a lovely treat with tea.

Ingredients

2 cups (240 g) AP flour
2 Tbsp, sugar, plus a bit more to sprinkle on top
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/4 cup cold unsalted butter, grated (Keep it cold and grate it right over the flour mix.)
1/2 cup golden raisins, Craisins or other chopped, dried fruit (optional)
7/8 cup (14 Tbsp) plain, full fat yogurt

Preheat the oven to 425 F.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and dried fruit, if using.

Grate the cold butter on top, and gently blend until the mixtures looks crumbly. Do not over work!

Add yogurt, and gently fold until it kind of starts to come together.

Using your hand, gently squeeze the dough to make it hold together a little more while it’s still in the bowl It will not form a solid lump and that’s okay.

Dump it all out onto a lightly floured surface. Again, it will likely still be very crumbly, but use your hands to push it together from the sides. Flip it over, adding a little more flour to the board if needed. If it is still really crumbly, you can drop tiny dollops of yogurt on the edges until it mostly comes together. Fold it over and pat it out at least a couple of times.

Do not overwork – and try to avoid warming the dough with your hands.

Divide the dough into two halves. Place each half on a baking sheet (can use parchment paper or a silicon mat if you have it) and pat it into two rounds about 3/4″ deep. Brush with a little yogurt on the very top only, and sprinkle a little sugar on top of that. You can wrap them in plastic and refrigerate or freeze them at this point if you want, and then bake them when you want to.

Cut the round into 8 triangles, and pull them apart just a bit. Refrigerate for 15-20 minutes.

Bake 12-15 minutes until they’re golden with nice brown bits on top.

Serve warm with butter and jam. So good!

Ina’s Blueberry Ricotta Breakfast Cake

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A one layer cake, with powdered sugar dusted on top, sitting on a white plat, with a pink flowered napkin beside it on a wood counter.


This is another great Ina Garten recipe – sent out just before Mother’s Day.

It is so good, I have made it twice in the last week with some tiny tweaks. (I had to find a way to use up that extra cup of Ricotta, so honestly this is just me being thrifty. Not greedy, just thrifty, right?) Yes it’s chock-full of butter, cream and cheese – but in a good way. Although it says Breakfast cake, it is really good anytime – and especially good with tea.

Anyway, it is delish and comes together very easily. My rhubarb is coming in fast and I may try making it with rhubarb instead of blueberry next time.

INGREDIENTS

10 Tbsp (1¼ sticks) butter, at room temperature
1 cup sugar
3 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup whole-milk ricotta
2 Tbsp sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp grated lemon zest
1¼ cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
2 cups fresh blueberries (12 ounces), divided
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Ina greases and flours a 9-inch round springform pan, but there’s a lot of butter in there, so I just skipped it. You do you.

Beat butter and sugar in an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then add the ricotta, sour cream, vanilla and lemon zest. Ina mentions the better will look curdled and it does. No worries – everything is fine.

In a small bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, and 1 teaspoon salt. Add to the butter mixture and beat very gently until the flour mixture is incorporated. Fold 2/3 of the blueberries into the batter with a rubber spatula. Pour into springform pan and drop the remaining blueberries on, pressing them in lightly.

Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool and remove pan sides. Dust with powdered sugar and serve warm or at room temp. So good!

First Watch Roasted Potatoes

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First Watch is a restaurant near us with the most heavenly breakfast potatoes. For that matter, their avocado toast is a thing of beauty – so when I saw they have a cookbook, I had to get it.

Anyway, I made their roasted potatoes for Easter over the weekend and it was really good. I had to scale up to make enough to feed 16 people (as a side dish) but you could easily cut it down for fewer people. I also made it slightly differently, because I wanted to make it partly the day before and do the final roasting on Easter morning.

INGREDIENTS

5 lbs. gold potatoes, scrubbed, but not peeled, diced into ½” pieces
2 ½ cups onions, slivered (more is fine, too)
10 Tbsp olive oil (½ cup and 2 Tbsp)
5 Tbsp First Watch Seasoning Mix (See recipe below)

DIRECTIONS

If cooking right away, prepare potatoes. If not, skip to the onions, oil and seasoning part.

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Add potatoes, and cook for roughly 10 minutes until just al dente. (Not fully cooked, but not hard, either.)

Pour out into a colander and immediately put in ice water to stop the cooking. (I just dumped it out and filled the pot with a pitcher of water and ice cubes. Then dumped the potatoes into the ice water.)

Once completely cooled, put the potatoes back in the colander and let them drain a bit until no more water runs out.

If you’re cooking ahead of time: In a large skillet on medium heat, heat oil and add onions. Saute for a several minutes, stirring regularly. Once onions are softened and translucent, add the seasoning mix and stir well. Remove from heat. Cool and refrigerate until needed.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

When ready to cook, toss the potatoes with the onions and seasoning until nicely coated. Dump into a large sheet pan, smooth out and roast in oven for 30 minutes. Check after 25 minutes, and if needed, toss them a bit. The burned bits are where the flavor is, so keep all those burned bits!

Serve hot and enjoy!


First Watch Seasoning Mix

INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup kosher salt
2 Tbsp freshly ground black peppers
1 Tbsp garlic powder
1/2 Tbsp onion salt
1 1/2 Tbsp paprika.

Mix well and store in a mason jar.

Yogurt, Raspberries and Granola

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This is the simplest breakfast, dessert or snack imaginable, but it’s really good, and it looks so pretty!

The tartness of the raspberries is perfect with the yogurt and the jam and granola give them just the right amount of sweetness. I honestly would rather have this than ice cream for dessert.

For 1 serving:

2/3 cup 2% Fage Plain Yogurt (5.3 oz )
couple small spoons Raspberry jam
6-7 fresh raspberries
couple spoons of Cinnamon Granola

Place yogurt into a pretty serving dish, pour jam over (may need to add a drop or two of water to thin.) Sprinkle fresh raspberries over and then granola. Yum!

Yogurt with Berries and Granola

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When you want a really light, delicious breakfast, snack or dessert, nothing beats good yogurt, berries and granola. This is a dish that I make all the time, but never think of writing down.

We usually buy the best whole milk plain yogurt we can find (Brown Cow makes amazing yogurt!) and then add a little honey or jam. My favorite jam to add is Spicy Peach, paired with Cinnamon Granola. But you can really use almost any jam or fruit, even a frozen berry mix if you want to, and any granola you have on hand.

Ingredients

1 cup any berries – blueberries, raspberries and blackberries are good
1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
1 1/2 Tbsp Spicy Peach Jam
handful of Cinnamon Granola

In a wide, flat bowl start with yogurt, and drop jam over in little plops. (Technical term.) Toss berries and then granola over. Stir gently and devour.

Mushroom, Leek & Cheese Scrambled Eggs

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Poked through the veggie drawer this morning, hungry for something “brunchy” yet healthy. Fortunately I had some really nice mushrooms and a leek, perfect for scrambled eggs. I made up a recipe on the fly and to my delight, it was surprisingly delicious. Thought I’d have enough for leftovers, but nope – ate the whole thing!

Ingredients:

1 Tbsp olive oil
2 cups sliced mushrooms
1 medium leek, halved and cut into 1″ pieces (be sure to wash really well)
1/4 cup diced onions
2 Tbsp diced peppers
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 kosher salt
few grinds of freshly ground black pepper
Pinch of dried basil leaves
½ tsp butter
2 eggs, beaten
1 slice sharp cheddar cheese (approximately) torn into smaller pieces

Heat olive oil on medium heat in a large frying pan and add mushroom, onions and peppers. Cook, stirring occasionally until the mushrooms have released their water and it has dried back up again. (7-8 minutes?) Add the butter, leeks and seasonings and saute for another 5 minutes.

Once leeks have softened up a bit, turn the heat way down. After a few minutes stir in the beaten eggs and start folding and gently stirring. Once eggs are mostly cooked, add cheese and continue folding and stirring until cheese is mostly melted. Check seasoning and serve immediately.

French Toast with Sautéed Blueberries

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I love French Toast. Don’t know why I don’t make it more often. Probably because Kumy is such a pancake guy. French Toast is honestly so easy that I’ve never written it down until now.

I also like using fruit with just a bit of of sugar, maple syrup or honey for sweetening. If the berries are really sweet, you may not need to add all the sugar. You can also substitute eggnog for the milk – it’s delicious – or you could just as easily use Oatmilk if you like.

Ingredients:

French Toast
3 1″ slices of bread (mine was a flatter loaf)
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/8 tsp Cinnamon
1/2 tsp Vanilla
Pinch of salt

Berries
1 Tbsp butter
2 tsp brown sugar or 1 tsp honey
1/2 cup blueberries or any other fresh berries

Mix eggs, milk, cinnamon and vanilla in a flat bowl or pie pan. Lay bread slices in the mixture, and flip them over. Let soak in for a few minutes, pushing down on them once in a while to make sure they soak up as much of the milk mixture as possible.

Heat a nonstick skillet over medium heat. You can add a little butter to the pan, but you really don’t need it with nonstick.

Place soaked bread in skillet, drizzling any leftover milk mix over. Cook for 3-4 minutes, or until it’s starting to get a bit golden underneath. Flip over and cook another 2 minutes, until it’s golden on the bottom and starting to get a little brown.

Remove French Toast to a serving plate.

Quickly add the butter and let it melt. Toss brown sugar over and stir for 10-15 seconds. Add blueberries and sauté blueberries in the sugar butter mixture for a minute. Pour berries and everything over the French Toast.

Delish!

Mel’s Cheesy Bacon Croissant Breakfast Casserole

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I mixed this up on Christmas Eve, and baked and served it for Christmas Brunch this morning. It was incredibly delicious – another great recipe from Mel’s Kitchen Cafe. Mel uses shallots or red onions, and doesn’t add hot sauce, but other than that, this is really her recipe. We all flipped over it and I love that you can make the night before!

Ingredients:

1 pound (454 g) croissants, halved lengthwise (about 5-7 small/medium croissants, or 4 giant Costco ones)
8 to 10 slices bacon, chopped into 1″ slices (I use thick-sliced. See my bacon chopping trick.)
½ cup diced onion
2 cups sharp cheddar cheese (freshly-grated is best)
9 large eggs
2 cups milk (I used 2%)
1 cup heavy cream
1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
2-3 dashes hot sauce

INSTRUCTIONS
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Slice the croissants in 1″pieces and lay in a 9×12″ baking dish. Bake 10-12 minutes, tossing halfway. You want them to be a little toasted.

In a large skillet, cook the bacon until crisp. Remove the bacon to a plate, and remove all but a tablespoon of the bacon grease from the skillet. Add onion and sauté 3-5 minutes.

Mix eggs, milk, cream, salt, pepper and hot sauce in a bowl.

Sprinkle bacon and onions over the croissants. Then sprinkle cheese over and finally pour the egg mixture over. You don’t need to toss it or anything.

Cover and refrigerate 4 hours or overnight.

Remove cover and bake for 45-50 minutes.

Let stand 15 minutes and serve. Wow.

Baked Apple Oatmeal

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  • Baked Apple Oatmeal
  • Bueberry Oatmeal – ready for the oven.

Another MelsKitchenCafe recipe – and I like this because you can prep it ahead of time and it isn’t overly sweet. It makes a great breakfast on a cold morning, but you could even use this as a treat with afternoon tea. Or as a weeknight dessert, served with a dollop of sweetened, whipped cream.

Update: I recently made this with blueberries, mixing 2 cups fresh big berries with a cup of smaller frozen berries. It was absolutely delicious!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups old-fashioned regular style oats
3/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp freshly ground Nutmeg
1/4 – 1/3 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cups milk
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 T butter, melted, (omit for a vegan version)
2 large apples, cored and chopped (no need to peel) (I used Gala, but really you can mix it up.) or use 3 cups of blueberries.

Mix oats, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and brown sugar. If you like things a bit sweeter, use the larger amount of brown sugar.

Mix the milk, egg, vanilla and melted butter, and pour into the oats. Stir gently to combine

Place chopped apples or blueberries in the bottom of a 9×9 cake pan, (or a 9×12 pan as shown) and top with the oatmeal mixture. You can cover and hold this overnight, or you can bake it straight away at 350 degrees for about 35 minutes. Delish!

Shakshuka with Feta Cheese 

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shakshuka-full-size

I love a dish that uses pantry ingredients, and Shakshuka is a great breakfast dish that does so. It serves 4-6 people, and with hot naan and hot tea, this was so good!  You can bake this in the oven, or just keep it covered on low heat on the stove once you’ve added the eggs.

Ingredients

3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 large onion, halved and thinly sliced
1 large red bell pepper, seeded and diced
3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced or 1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp sweet or smoked paprika
⅛ tsp ground cayenne, or to taste
1 large can diced tomatoes, with juices
1 smaller can Ro-tel tomatoes
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp butter or bacon drippings
1 tsp kosher salt, to taste
¼ tsp black pepper, to taste
5 ounces feta, crumbled (about 1 1/4 cups) Fresh Mozzarella, cubed is good, too.
4-6 large eggs

Chopped cilantro, for serving  (use more than shown in the photo – I was almost out!)
Hot sauce, for serving

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-low. Add onion and bell pepper. Cook gently until very soft, about 20 minutes, stirring from time to time.

Add garlic and cook until tender, 1 to 2 minutes; stir in cumin, paprika and cayenne, and cook 1 minute.

Heat oven to 375 degrees, if baking.

Pour in tomatoes and season with 1 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper; simmer until tomatoes have thickened, about 10 minutes. Taste and add more salt and pepper if needed.

Stir in crumbled feta. Using a larger spoon, create one little “crater” for each egg, and gently crack the eggs into them. Season eggs with a little more salt and pepper.

If baking: transfer skillet to oven and bake until eggs are just set, 7 to 10 minutes. Check the whites to be sure they are cooked. (Unless you like uncooked egg whites, but ugh – not me!) IF you really like your yolks cooked, let it cook a little longer.

If cooking on stove, cover and reduce heat to very low.  Watch for whites to fully cook.

Sprinkle with cilantro and serve with hot sauce and warm naan, pita bread or whole wheat tortillas.