Sausage Breakfast Casserole

During the cold winter months I often crave comfort foods.  At home growing up this was always some sort of casserole dish.  Always high calorie and full of gluten and wheat products.  As I eat cleaner and find myself avoiding those foods as much as I can without insulting relatives ("What do you mean you don't want my brownies that I worked on all day to make?").  I still crave the comfort foods.  This version of breakfast casserole is tasty and relatively low calorie and higher in nutrients compared to a potato based one.  Added bonus...5 ingredients! 

Ingredients:

Approximately 4 servings
1 pound ground breakfast sausage or other ground meat
3 turnips, peeled and grated (a food processor works well for this)
1/2 onion diced
4 eggs
3 scallions, chopped

Instructions:
Sauté sausage and onions, breaking it the sausage into small pieces with a spoon or spatula, until almost cooked through.  Mix the sausage and onions with the rest of the ingredients.
Spoon into a 8×8 baking pan.  When ready to cook, heat oven to 400 degrees. Bake for 45 minutes then cover the pan and bake for 25 minutes more. Let cool 15-20 minutes so the casserole sets before cutting into it.  (my wife prefers this with a little shredded cheese on top...that ups the calories though)

Qwik Cookin'

One of the things that I get asked the most when presenting healthy, inexpensive, easy to cook meals is 'How do I do it?'. It seems that there is a whole generation of people that don't cook. Every meal is take-out, eating out, microwave or delivery. I don't blame anybody for this and I used to be the same way in college and right out of college. I had an advantage that I had worked in restaurants since the age of 16 so I always knew my way around the kitchen, but most people my age (34) seem to have skipped that day in Home-Ec (my wife hates to cook so this post will hit very close to home).

The meals I create at home and for menu plans try to encompass a few virtues.

1. Quick - I hate, hate, hate coming home from a long day at work and then spending an hour to cook a meal. BOO! On the weekend maybe.

2. Easy - By this I mean few ingredients. I always try for 5 or less, optimal is 3; this makes it hard to screw up as well.

3. Healthy - Fresh ingredients with low levels of processed carbs, gluten, dairy or beans.

We don't have a microwave so all meals are cooked over a gas range, on the grill, in the toaster oven or the real oven. Here a few tools that help to speed up the cookin'

TOOLS

Mandolin - quickly slice up your veggies but watch your fingers! Great for squash and zucchini. Added a picture b/c lots of people don't know what it looks like!


Go to the gear page to see the stuff I use in my kitchen!





Hand Chopper - Makes quick work of veggies that need to be chopped or minced. Keep it washed and clean. I love this picture; I don't have a slap chop though.











Pressure Cooker - Cook your food faster! I hate waiting an hour for delicious acorn or spaghetti squash.

Toaster Oven - We currently cook for two so we rarely have a need for heating up the oven (takes too long!) Works great for corn tortillas.

Crock Pot - The ultimate in lazy cooking! Throw in meat, veggies, water, spice. Set it on low and go to work. 6-8 hours later - eat.

There are a ton of neat kitchen products out there but I rarely need more than these to cook any meal besides a good set of pans, knives and cutting board.

More recipies coming!