The first of what I hope will be a weekly series of posts on my excursions into feeding people, usually at our home but sometimes somewhere else. (I’ll hope to develop my abilities as a photographer along the way.)
This past Saturday morning the Cherry Creek Chorale had its usual retreat rehearsal. Once per concert season, usually about every two months, we have this special, optional time for intensive work. We start formally at 9:00, so at 8:30 or so we serve breakfast as a bribe to get as many people as possible to come. I try to serve one hot item and always have fruit, juice, coffee, and hard boiled eggs, these last four items provided by my wonderful committee members. Then we have some other items, usually some kind of bread-related thing. Originally, the plan for this breakfast was to have the casserole plus homemade muffins–all made by me–with some bagels to fill in the gaps. I kept thinking, Oh, I’ll put the casserole together Friday afternoon and then premix the wet and the dry ingredients for the muffins. Then I’ll have to figure out how to get everything baked the next morning and get to the rehearsal in time for setup . . . what was I thinking? Friday was a chemo day for Gideon and the process went longer than I had thought it would, so I didn’t get home until 1:00. I hadn’t done my shopping on Thursday as I should have done. So at 8:00 Friday evening as I was still cubing bread and grating cheese I said to myself, “Only one labor-intensive item per event!” And the muffins got cut, with a corresponding increase in the bagels. (Did you know that you can pre-order items from Panera and they’ll have them sitting ready on the shelf? What a great system.) We’ll do them next time, when I’m doing a casserole that doesn’t take so much work. We have a new chorale member this season who’s a prize-winning baker, so I’m going to see what she’d be willing to do in the muffin department. Because I came to my senses in time, I got to bed at a decent hour and then got to the rehearsal by 7:30. We were ready in plenty of time and actually came out even on the food–every cook’s dream. Here’s the recipe for the casserole:
Union Square Brunch
Adapted from A Cozy Book of Breakfasts & Brunches by Jim Brown and Karletta Moniz, Prima Publishing, 1997.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 pounds sausage any kind you like. I use the Boulder Italian sausage that they sell at Costco, which is sort of halfway between hot and mild and isn't very fatty.
- 2 cups onion finely diced
- 1 pound mushrooms* thinly sliced
- 1 loaf French or Italian bread, cubed**
- 3/4 pound*** sharp cheddar cheese**** coarsely grated
- 6 eggs
- 2 1/2 cups milk
Instructions
-
Remove the sausage from casings if you're using links and brown in a large pot, breaking up the meat into fairly small pieces. Remove sausage from pan with a slotted spatula, leaving fat behind. If there's not too much (judgment call here), then just leave it and use that as your fat for sauteing the onions and mushrooms. Pour off whatever you think is excessive. Saute the onions until soft, then add the mushrooms. Cook until almost all of the liquid has evaorated. This step is very important, since leaving the moisture in the mushrooms results in a soupy mess. Believe me, I know! Meanwhile, grate the cheese and mix the eggs and milk in a bowl. Spread the bread, sausage, vegetables and cheese in a 9x13 baking dish, mixing to distribute evenly. Pour the egg/milk mixture over this and make sure that all the bread is in contact with the liquid. I use a spatula and press down on the top. Cover the pan with foil and refrigerate overnight. Take the pan out of the fridge the next morning while you heat the over to 350 degrees. Uncover the pan and bake for about an hour, until the top is browned and the middle is completely set.
Recipe Notes
*I usually use crimini mushrooms, small brown mushrooms that have more flavor than ordinary white mushrooms. (Although it's an interesting fact that crimini mushrooms are simply more mature white mushrooms. Their greater age makes them meatier and firmer, with fuller flavor. But ordinary white mushrooms will also do fine.) Rinsing, wiping, trimming and slicing fresh mushrooms takes some time, true. But the effort is worth the result!
**This recipe is basically what is usually called a strata, meaning layers, and the original version has you use slices of bread. But then you have to get the ingredients all spread out evenly between the bread. I think it's much easier to cube the bread and then just mix all the meat, cheese and vegetables up with those cubes, pack that mixture into the pan, and then pour the egg/milk mixture over. If you use a baguette you'll need two, or at least enough to equal about a pound. I've used King Soopers multi-grain French bread and Costco's country French bread with great success.
***You can add extra on the top, if you really like cheese. (And who doesn't?)
****The original recipe calls for Cheddar, and that's what I tend to use. If you have something else on hand, though, that's reasonably flavorful (Gruyere, for example), go ahead with that. I wouldn't use a bland cheese such as mozzarella.
