Another day, another potluck
I mentioned earlier this month, or possibly last month, that my church choir would be singing Vivaldi's Gloria in worship this year. And we did, this morning! In fact, we parts of it twice; we did eight of the 12 movements -- nos. 1-3, 6-7, and 10-12, if you must know -- scattered throughout the traditional service at 9:00 a.m., and nos- 1, 3, and 12 at the very beginning of the 11:00 a.m. contemporary service.
Since we had to stick around for both services, the director decided we should throw ourselves a nice potluck brunch between the two. Her experience is that a choir that has fun together sings together better, so we have little social events like this at least once a month. This was a bit more elaborate than our usual post-rehearsal socials, but it was a special occasion.
I signed up to provide an egg dish. My first thought was to make something with chorizo in it, but before I could respond to the signup email, another member said he'd bring a dish with green chiles in it. I didn't think we should have two spicy dishes, so I poked around on allrecipes.com and decided on a ham, spinach, and mushroom egg dish.
When I finally settled on a recipe yesterday, though, I ended up using a recipe that called for broccoli instead of spinach. I made it last night and reheated it at the church during the first service. I thought it tasted pretty good, and since there was nothing left of it but the dish at the end of the meal, I think the others may have agreed.
Broccoli, Mushrooms, Ham, and Cheddar Baked with Eggs
Ingredients
- 1 lb. brown or white mushrooms, sliced
- 1 T olive oil
- 4 cups broccoli flowerets, cut into fairly small pieces
- 2 cups diced ham (if making this for the South Beach Diet, use lean ham with not more than 10% fat)
- 2 cups grated low-fat cheese (I used Four Cheese Mexican Blend)
- 12 eggs
- 1 tsp. Spike Seasoning (or your favorite all-purpose seasoning that's good with eggs)
- fresh ground black pepper to taste
Directions
Preheat oven to 375F/190C. Spray a 10" x 14" glass baking dish with nonstick spray.
Heat olive oil in large frying pan, then saute mushrooms until they're soft and liquid has evaporated, about 8 minutes. While mushrooms cook, chop broccoli and bring a large pot of slightly salted water to a boil. Put chopped broccoli into water and cook 2-3 minutes (not longer, because the broccoli will cook more when this bakes.) Drain broccoli into a colander placed in the sink, and let drain while you chop the ham.
In a glass baking dish layer the blanched broccoli, sauteed mushrooms, diced ham, and grated cheese. Beat the eggs with the Spike Seasoning and black pepper and pour over the other ingredients. Use a fork to gently stir until all the broccoli, mushrooms, ham, and cheese are coated with egg.
Bake 50-60 minutes, or until the eggs are set and the top of the egg bake is slightly browned. Serve hot, topped with a dollop of low-fat sour cream if desired. Makes about 8 servings.
Recipe created by Kalyn
I followed the recipe pretty closely, though I used frozen broccoli and pre-diced ham. (I did follow the suggestion of not fully cooking the broccoli before adding it to the casserole, though.) For the seasoning, I used Mrs Dash Garlic & Herb Salt-Free Seasoning Blend, because that's what I had. And I didn't spray the dish with non-stick spray because I forgot.