Spin Dip Baked Eggs ♥

Spin Dip Baked Eggs, another health breakfast recipe ♥ A Veggie Venture
graphic button small size size 10 It's a quick, healthy, low carb and high protein breakfast, just "spin dip" (that's what restaurants call their popular spinach and spinach-artichoke appetizers) with runny eggs baked in the same skillet. Gorgeous good! Keep a bag or two of frozen spinach in the fridge, breakfast'll move from great idea to the table in minutes. graphic button small size size 10

BOR-ING. That's me, about breakfast. Day in, day out, I could eat the same thing for breakfast. At school, the morning ritual was an English muffin with peanut butter. (Who else adores how salty peanut butter oozes into the little holes of a just-toasted English muffin?) Then came a cup of yogurt, handy for catching the bus to work. Then for y-e-a-r-s, I stirred peanut butter into oatmeal. (Hmm, is it the warm peanut butter? Maybe!) In last years, it's been another oatmeal porridge, half old-fashioned and half steel-cut, cooked in milk.

But the men I live with (that'd be Jerry and my almost 91-year old father who lives with us) get bored by breakfast repetition. So I'm always on the hunt for quick and healthy breakfasts, high protein and low carb, that can be cooked with a minimum of prep and cleanup for an early-morning, not-yet-fully-caffeinated brain.

This one's a winner, it has three fans in this household. One of us (one guess?) could eat it every day, it's that magical combination of bitter greens and runny eggs – check the list of recipes below for more spinach-egg combos.

RECIPE for SPIN DIP BAKED EGGS

Hands-on time: 20 minutes
Time to table: 30 minutes
Serves 6

1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 a small onion, diced small
1/2 red pepper, diced small (set aside a few pieces for garnish)
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
1 teaspoon ground cumin
16 ounces (454g) frozen leaf spinach, thawed
4 ounces (113g) low-fat cream cheese (neufchatel)
1 cup 2% milk
Salt & pepper to taste
Up to 6 large eggs

Set oven to 500F/260C, here, that's the "broil" function. Place a rack in the center position.

In a large, oven-safe non-stick skillet with a cover, heat oil on medium heat. Stir in onion and pepper as they're prepped, cook just until beginning to soften. Stir in garlic and cumin, let cook for 1 minute. Stir in spinach and heat through, let cook for about 5 minutes. Stir in cream cheese until well distributed, then slowly add milk, a tablespoon or two at a time at first. Bring almost to a boil but do not allow to boil. Taste and adjust seasoning.

With the back of a spoon, create depressions for the eggs, crack an egg into each one. Sprinkle the eggs with a little salt and pepper. Cover and bake for 5 - 10 minutes, until the eggs cook to the desired consistency.

MAKE-AHEAD The spinach mixture could easily be made ahead of time and then brought back to temperature before adding the eggs.

LEFTOVERS The spinach leftovers warm up beautifully in the microwave. Once or twice, I've rewarmed leftover spinach in the microwave, then topped it with a fried egg – or stirred in a little cottage cheese for a quick lunch.

VARIATIONS "Spin Dip" often includes chopped artichoke, I think you could easily add a canful. Recently, a weekend guest made a cheesy artichoke dip for an impromptu dinner, combining canned artichoke hearts and marinated artichoke hearts about 2:1. When I remade her dip later, I compared the taste of Trader Joe's marinated artichokes to Mario's marinated artichokes. Hands down, Mario's won.

ALANNA'S TIPS & KITCHEN NOTES
FROZEN SPINACH It surprises me, how long thawed frozen spinach keeps in the fridge. I'm always worried about using it up within a day or two of thawing. Instead? I put it in a quart mason jar and it keeps a good week. Anybody else do this?
GARLIC POWDER vs GRANULATED GARLIC I've long kept garlic powder in the spice cupboard, right next to the onion powder and celery salt. But granulated garlic? That was a new seasoning to me, until one St. Louis chef after another called for it in recipes for my column in the local newspaper, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Both products are slow-dried garlic, garlic powder is ground quite fine where granulated garlic is slightly coarse. To my taste, the granulated form is slightly more garlic-y.



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A Veggie Venture is home of "veggie evangelist" Alanna Kellogg and the
famous asparagus-to-zucchini Alphabet of Vegetables.

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Alanna Kellogg
Alanna Kellogg

A Veggie Venture is home of "veggie evangelist" Alanna Kellogg and the famous asparagus-to-zucchini Alphabet of Vegetables.

Comments

  1. I just made your spin dip baked eggs. Nice. You seem to be back in the groove of writing about your cooking, now with your husband and your father as an appreciative audience, it seems. I am glad to see it.

    ReplyDelete

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Thank you for taking a moment to write! I read each and every comment, for each and every recipe, whether a current recipe or a long-ago favorite. If you have a specific question, it's nearly always answered quick-quick. ~ Alanna