My go-to holiday breakfast

Hey Mrs. Reed....(does that sound too much like I'm addressing your mother-in-law?)...

I had to share what has become our family's traditional holiday breakfast (meaning we have this on Christmas morning and Easter morning....mornings when I'd rather be holding a camera than a spatula, and I let my oven do all the work).



And guess what? I have already prepared my Christmas morning breakfast for this year. It took about ten minutes of assembling.  If you don't have any inspirations for this year, you should try it. I think your picky people would love it.

And YOU will love it because I won't tell you exact amounts of the ingredients. It is so easy that it can be thrown together without a lot of measuring. Yes, I'm growing as a person.


Make-Ahead Holiday Sausage & Egg Strata
{a.k.a. one less thing to worry about}

(adapted from a recipe in this cookbook)

STEP 1: Line a buttered 9x13 dish with sliced up bread. (cut the crusts off if it is tough)

STEP 2: Sprinkle the bread with cooked, diced up sausage - I use an entire pkg of turkey sausage links, about one pound.





STEP 3: Mix together in a bowl 4 eggs, 2.5 cups of half and half (or milk or a combo), salt, pepper, and a small handful of dried or fresh herbs that go well with eggs. I usually use thyme, the recipe calls for sage. Chives would be great too.

STEP 4: Pour the egg mixture over the sausage and bread.

STEP 5: Cover the dish with shredded cheese.





STEP 6: Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, or until browning and puffed up. (If you're cooking it straight from the fridge, it will take a little longer.)

I can't show you my "after" picture because I'm not cooking it until Christmas morning, remember? So here is what the cookbook shows.

So my strata strategy, if you will, is this:

Christmas morning, wake up right before my kids do. Preheat the oven to 350*, and put the strata from the cold fridge into the cold oven. So it warms up as the oven heats. Grab the camera. Don't think about the breakfast during the next 30 minutes of happiness and kisses and shredded wrapping paper and giggles. Smell my breakfast being prepared for me...mmmmm.

Eat, relaxed, with my family at the table. Kids ask for seconds. Probably use paper plates. And we have enough hearty, protein-rich food in our tummies to last us until we arrive at someone's house for Christmas Day.

That, my friend, is a little peace on earth.