Baked Eggs Brunch

Last night we went out for Halloween with our friends to do karaoke at the Bear Paw Inn. A cold conversation the previous Saturday night waiting outside in the rain to see Quasi at Satyricon actually evolved into an plan. Me, Shawn, and our friends Stacey & Chris ended up dressing up as characters from one of our favorite TV shoes, Twin Peaks. Shawn was Agent Cooper, I was Audrey Horne, Stacey was the Log Lady, and Chris was our favorite creepy character, Bob. For having thought it up only a week prior and going shopping the day of, we did pretty well!

Me and Shawn as two of our favorite Twin Peaks characters

I needed an easy breakfast to make for the day after the fun. We've also been in a bit of a breakfast rut of breakfast meat and eggs. Boring. My friend Emy directed me to this baked eggs recipe and I must say, it was both easy and delicious.

To save money, I got the bacon ends and pieces since I would be cutting it up anyway. $.78 sounded like a good price to me! I also decided not to use cream since I didn't have any on hand and didn't want to spend the money. I sprinkled some feta over the eggs before baking--I highly recommend it. I also didn't have another ramekin, so I just used my Le Creuset baking dish. I probably could have taken them out a minute earlier, but I hate runny whites, so I left it in a little longer. I'm guessing that it was not using the ramekins that caused the longer cooking time for my eggs.

Carefully remove the individual servings, it will be slippery!

Baked Eggs with Bacon and Spinach (from Epicurious.com)

6 slices applewood-smoked bacon
1 5-ounce bag baby spinach
2 whole wheat or sourdough English muffins, split horizontally, well toasted (IMPORTANT!)
4 large eggs
4 tablespoons heavy whipping cream


Preheat oven to 400°F. Cook bacon in large skillet over medium heat until crisp; transfer to paper towels. Pour off drippings from skillet; reserve drippings. Add spinach to pan, sprinkle with pepper, and toss over medium heat, 1 minute. Transfer to strainer set over bowl to drain. Brush four 1-cup ramekins with drippings. Crumble bacon.

Place 1 toasted English muffin half, split side up, in each ramekin. Divide spinach among ramekins, then sprinkle bacon over, dividing equally. With back of spoon, shape well in center of each ramekin. Gently crack 1 egg into well in each ramekin, keeping yolk intact. Drizzle 1 tablespoon cream over each egg. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Bake eggs until whites are just set but yolks are still runny, 14 to 16 minutes.

Game Day Snack: Mushroom Dip

After a very relaxing and fun honeymoon, Shawn and I decided to spend our entire Sunday basically on the couch, watching football. Ok, in reality, it's not much different than most of our Sundays during football season. But I digress. New Seasons had a great sale on mushrooms, so I decided to stock up and make us a special dip for our Sunday of laziness. Instead of getting my usual variety pack, which they were out of, I used a mixed of crimini mushrooms and a small package of oyster mushrooms. You can really choose whatever you like, but do yourself a favor and at least get criminis.

I rarely alter a recipe on my first attempt making it. I feel that a recipe was constructed the way it was for a reason, so I want to give it a fair shot before trying to make it better (a pet peeve of mine when I scroll through the reviews of recipes on Epicurious.com, again I digress...). However, this time, having some extra yummy ingredients laying around, I made an exception.

We had a couple of pieces of prosciutto from our in-room picnic at The Allison during our honeymoon, so I diced those up and fried them until crispy and set aside. I added my butter to the bit of grease left over from the prosciutto and sauteed the onions first. Once those become nice and golden brown, add the sliced mushrooms. After the mushrooms had some time to soak up the butter and other flavors, I added a splash of the open bottle of Argyle Chardonnay, let that cook off, then added a pinch of dried thyme, the bleu cheese, and red pepper flakes. I put all that into a serving dish and topped it off with the crispy prosciutto and more sliced green onion.

Wait to add mushrooms until onions are golden brown (not quite there yet)

Mushrooms go in

Did I mention that I halved the recipe??

Serve with crusty bread (and more cheese!) for the most delicious game day snack imaginable

New Seasons Mushroom Dip (Recipe as printed)
3 1/2 Tbls butter
2 yellow onions, minced
2 green onions, minced
1 lb mushrooms, any variety, cleaned and sliced
1/2 cup crumbled Gorgonzola cheese
1/2 tsp salt
Pinch of red pepper flakes (optional)

In large skillet over medium-low heat, melt butter. Add onions and saute until golden brown, about 7-10 minutes. Stir in mushrooms and continue to cook until tender, another 6-8 minutes. Decrease heat to low and stir in cheese, salt and red pepper flakes (if using) and continue to cook, stirring frequently until cheese is thoroughly combined an even consistency is achieved.

Getting Ready for a Spanish Thanksgiving

I just bought a cazuela for our upcoming Spanish Thanksgiving (thanks to Kara and Emy and the Williams Sonoma gift card they gave me). Now I'm just trying to decide which tapas recipes to use and where I'm going to cook everything! So far all I have on the menu is paella and stuffed mussels. Can't wait to experiment!

Wedding Project

Last weekend, I became Mrs. Montgomery. It was a spectacular weekend full of good friends and family, great food, and plenty of delicious wine. A couple of days before the wedding after the majority of our family had arrived, we had a little get together at our house so that everyone could meet and relax a bit before the wedding madness began.

Since Shawn's niece was visiting as well, and I know that hanging out with a bunch of adults all weekend can get a little boring, I thought of a fun project we could do together--make a 3-layer Rice Krispie treat cake for the rehearsal dinner.

7 recipes of Rice Krispie treats later, it was complete.

The bottom layer got a nice chocolate filling

Maddy is a master at stirring marshmallows

It was difficult to find something big enough to build it on, so we flipped it out onto wax paper and my sister and I carefully slid it onto the upside tray

Almost complete...

Dark chocolate covered almonds did the trick

A little decoration

The hubby and I cutting the cake with the biggest knife known to man

Serious Slacking

I swear I'm still alive and breathing. My last post was the beginning of August and that makes me sad. I have good excuses (job changing mania, settling into the house, tests, wedding planning...), but really, there's no excuse for this long of an absence.

I have been cooking, but not as much as I'd like. Long story short, I made a big career move earlier this year and worked toward becoming a personal trainer. I studied for my test, passed it in August, and have recently decided to go back to marketing work. It's a long story, but basically, I have little to no time for anything but working these days. So, combine all that with my wedding being 3 weeks away (WOOT!)...we've been eating a lot of quick meals.

However, I do want to share some pictures of the bounty that is the garden I inherited when we moved into our new house in SE Portland. We have been enjoying delicious tomatoes from the garden at most meals. There were plenty of zucchini about a month ago...then I killed them all by letting the weeds and flowering of other plants take over. There's another reason I need to work less than 60 hours a week...

Beautiful raised beds of oregano, thyme, peas, lettuce (or what used to be lettuce), parsley, and carrots

Hang on little tomato!

Are we an heirloom? Me thinks we are.

I made at least a couple of dishes this summer. Here's proof!

Near perfect calzone--great way to use leftovers!

S'more pie (care of Smitten Kitchen) that I made for our Friday the 13th movie marathon

And a quick picture of one of our fabulous dishes from Toro Bravo. We used a gift certificate I had to celebrate Shawn's birthday last month. Of course, even with the gift certificate, we managed to go a little crazy. It was so worth it, though.

Manchego & paprika fritters with salsa roja

Sadly, I did not take a picture of the near-perfect roast chicken I made last weekend and the creamed mushrooms that accompanied them. Oh mushrooms...how I love you. I received a birthday present from my grandma (oh yeah, I also turned 30 in all that) of a cookbook put together by Seattle public television KCTS. I had a chicken and knew I wanted to roast it, so I checked my new cookbook for an accompanying dish, and lo and behold, there were the mushrooms. I ended up throwing on some sauteed bread crumbs to make it similar to the dish we had a the Gruner preview dinner (creamed mushrooms and buckwheat spaetzle topped with breadcrumbs). I'm going to say it was a hit as Michael was literally sopping up the last of the sauce with his piece of Ken's bread.

I'm hoping to post more often from now on. With fall upon us, I'll definitely be getting back to bread baking and more soups. Until then, wish me luck with the rest of wedding planning--I'm going to need it.

Vietnamese Noodles & Beef

Your long-lost food blogger has returned. This has been a crazy month or so. Besides my career change and wedding planning, we also had to move. I can honestly report that it has turned out to be a move for the better. Our new house is fabulous and is complete with a ready-made vegetable garden. I'll get to that in a future post. I have yet to take pictures of all the beautiful plants I have growing back there. We've been feasting on fresh lettuce, zucchini, and soon...tomatoes! My favorite summer treat.

For now, you'll have to be satisfied reading about the delicious, easy, and healthy Sunday dinner I made: Vietnamese-style noodles with grilled beef.

Another delicious meal provided by Mr. Webber

Needing something to do with half a package of leftover whole wheat capellini and steaks on sale at New Seasons, I ended up with this recipe from Epicurious. I ended up reducing the amount of sugar by 1 tsp., but basically kept it the same. Since we were firing up the old grill, I decided we should also make use of it and grill the bell pepper that accompanies the noodles, as well as some onion. It made a delicious accompaniment. In the end, I wish I had reduced the amount of mint a bit, as well, but it was delicious even with that. Very refreshing and, minus the rather hefty sodium content that is expected with many Asian cuisines, a pretty healthy meal.

Last Webster Meal

Tonight's menu: grilled chicken with a spicy Asian glaze, corn on the cob, and grilled zucchini. A delicious way to end an era at the Webster house. On to new adventures in SE!

Spicy Asian Glaze (adjusted for 2 servings)
Adapted from America's Test Kitchen

1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
1/8 cup ketchup
2 T honey
1 T lemon juice
1 T Hoisin sauce
1-2 t Rooster sauce (depending on how spicy you like it)
1 t fresh grated ginger
1 minced garlic clove

Coat meat about 5 minutes before done cooking.