omeletty egg bake

Instead of the traditional made-to-order omelets at our family gathering in PA, my aunt made a bunch of egg casseroles for Sunday’s big brunch. One was bread based (this one) and the other wasn’t. When I asked about the difference, my aunt explained that the not bread-based one was more like an omelet, but in casserole form. Lots of meat, eggs, cheese, and veggies, straight-up.

Back home, I bought the ingredients I didn’t have, the cottage cheese and mushrooms (that I minced fine and my mushroom-hating husband never even knew they were there). The other stuff—the eggs, cheese, green peppers, and sausage—I already had on hand.

I assembled everything one Sunday afternoon and then baked it, along with a pan of hash browns and a batch of sky-high biscuits with homemade lard for a kick-your-butt-into-high-gear Monday morning breakfast.

My husband was like, “What has gotten into you?” and Melissa was like, “Can I have this on my birthday?”

Omeletty Egg Bake
Adapted from my aunt and she, in turn, got the recipe from All Recipes.

1 pound loose sausage
2 onions, chopped
2 sweet peppers (1 green and 1 red, if possible), chopped
½ pound mushrooms, sliced
½ pound monterey jack cheese, grated
4 tablespoons butter, melted
10 eggs, beaten
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 cups cottage cheese

Brown the sausage. Caramelize the onions in a bit of bacon grease, or butter, and sprinkle with salt. Saute the peppers. Lightly saute the mushrooms in a little butter.

In a large bowl, combine the sausage, onions, peppers, mushroom, and monterey jack cheese and then transfer to a 9×13 pan. Drizzle the melted butter over top. Combine the eggs, salt, black pepper, and cottage cheese and pour over the meat.

Bake the casserole (or cover and refrigerate until ready to bake) at 325 degrees for 30-40 minutes or until the middle is set. Serve hot.

If there are leftovers, count your lucky stars.

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (1.25.16), through my lens: a wedding, the quotidian (1.26.15), keep everlastingly at it, hobo beans, the quotidian (1.27.14), what you can do, first day of classes, and then we moved into a barn, five things, and corn tortillas.