Individual Potato Broccoli Frittatas - 2 ways

If I could design my perfect day, the recipe would be as follows:

Sleep in and wake up slow
Have a lunch of cider and doughnuts at your local cider mill of choice
Take a brisk hike in the woods
Eat a delicious, healthy, and leisurely prepared dinner
Watch Michigan football

Execute each step in this order with a good friend or loving spouse. Well, this was my Saturday. Exactly the respite I needed after a long week of work and not seeing my husband. : ( So, back to the food. I went with the idea of baking individual frittatas because I have made frittatas in a mini muffin pan for parties, and they turn out quite good. Also, I don't have a decent pan to go from stovetop to oven (ahhh...daydreaming of cast iron skillets), and I do have these great little non-stick 4 1/2 inch springform pans that we recieved as a wedding gift and have never used. You could, however, scale up the recipe for a 9 inch pie pan, or prepare the frittatas in a regular or jumbo size muffin pan.

Potato Broccoli Frittatas
adapted from Cooking Light

1 large redskin potato, cooked and diced
1/2 c. cooked broccoli
1 large clove garlic, crushed
2 sliced cooked bacon, chopped  (for my meat lover)
2 tbsp. chopped, cooked onion  (for me)
1-2 tbsp. chopped parsley
4 eggs
2 egg whites
1-2 tsbp. milk
2/3 c. grated cheese  (I used about 1/3 c. of 2 different kinds)
1/8-1/4 tsp. thyme
1/8-1/4 tsp. paprika
Salt and Pepper

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Spray pans with non-stick cooking spray. Add half of the potato, broccoli, and garlic to each pan. (I did cook the garlic with a little bit of olive oil ahead of time) Now comes the "2 way" part. To one I added the bacon and some grated cheddar cheese, and to the other I added the onion and my new favorite cheese, which is a combo of white cheddar, swiss, and parmesan. Mmmm. In a mixing bowl, beat together the eggs, milk, parsley, thyme, paprika, salt and pepper. Pour egg mixture over other ingredients. Bake for 30 minutes, or until golden brown around the edges. They will puff up quite a bit.

I did learn a valuable lesson when preparing this dish. Make sure that your springform pans are sealed properly and are liquid tight. Some of my egg mixtue leaked out when I poured it into the pans. One was worse then the other, and it just continued oozing. I kept saying "Oh, NO!" and laughing as the eggs weeped out of the side. But, since it was not completely gushing out, I gingerly threw them onto a cookie sheet with a piece of aluminum foil, and prayed for the best.  What I realized is that unlike a cheesecake, this egg mixture is thin and there is no crust to seal it off the bottom of the pans. Maybe not the best bakeware choice for this, but live and learn I guess.  The oozing did stop shortly after I put them in the oven, and the loss was not that much. They still turned out OK, and were very tatsy.  I served these with some crusty bread, and a tomato avocado salad drizzled with my homemade balsamic vinegarette.

I think my favorite thing about frittatas is that they are so versatile. You can put just about anything inside, like an omelette or a quiche. The possibilities are endless. Mushroom, onion, and swiss. Tomato and basil with parmesan. Ham and cheese.  Zucchini and squash, etc. Plus, it's a great way to get rid of some leftovers. Hmm...a Thanksgiving leftover frittata? Probably not. ;)