Brunch – Egg Muffins and Hash Browns

As I was surfing Pinterest to look for some ideas for breakfast, in the event I would wake up early enough to fix something more than cereal for the girls, I found several variations of the same thing that I had pinned.  I’m always searching for something I can make ahead of time and just warm up during the week.  Several pins showed the egg muffins as a good make ahead then warm and go.  I decided to try them today.

Egg Muffins

This sounded good and simple.  I even had everything I needed.  One of the variations was to use hash browns instead of eggs (oops! typo!) bread as the base of the muffin.  I’m all about hash browns, and I happened to have several potatoes that need to be used up.  Of course, my hash browns have never turned out right when I’ve tried to make them.  Fried potatoes I can do, but hash browns were out of my cooking ability.  So back to Pinterest for a how to make hash browns…..

Hash browns

The Pioneer Woman has given me LOTS of good tips and tricks for cooking!

So I started with shredding 1/2 a red onion, 3 small to medium russets, and a sweet potato.  As if I didn’t learn enough yesterday with trying to use a gadget to julienne vegetables, a box grater is not much neater…..sigh.  The real miracle is that between the julienne and the grater, I did not give a blood sample!  🙂   My shoulder is feeling it though.  The box grater was a bit of a workout after my julienne gadget.

I finally got enough of that mess cleaned up and into the frying pan, using bacon grease instead of butter, of course.  It did look pretty.

I did a “soft” fry vs a crispy since these are the base of the muffins and would be going into the oven.

I put a spoon of hash browns into the base of the muffin cups, topped with diced ham and shredded cheese, then poured the egg mixture over the top to fill the muffin cup.

I was very skeptical about adding ground mustard to the egg mixture.  I also thought I could get by with 7 eggs instead of 8.  The ground mustard added a nice flavor.  The reduction of egg would have been ok if I had remembered to add more milk.  I ended up mixing the 8th egg after the fact for the last 2 muffins.

** Note to self:  remember to grease the muffin tin!  The eggs stuck a bit.  They came out mostly, but would have done better if greased.  I think I also want to try adding more veggies next time, like broccoli, spinach, tomato, asparagus, mushrooms, or whatever I have on hand to the ham and cheese layer.  That will allow for less eggs and more “healthy stuff”.

I was very amazed by the calorie count (if I did it right).  Hash browns are usually so high on the calorie count that I have to avoid them.  There is such a huge difference in home cooked vs fast food.

Thanks for sharing my breakfast/brunch.  I hope you enjoyed my adventure.  I will try to add some of my other morning creations I make during the week.  I’ve gotten better at whipping up a decent egg breakfast before work.  Do you have a favorite egg recipe to share?  I would love to get some more ideas or hear how your muffins turned out.

Happy cooking!