Breakfast In A Flash

I'm pretty good at keeping foods for dinner in the freezer. I don't make that much effort with breakfast foods. Breakfast is so quick and easy to make, that I normally don't bother. But Daddy-O likes a bigger breakfast than I do. Like bacon and eggs. Or, sausage biscuits. And those do take more time in the morning.

Last week while I was on my quest to restock the freezer, I added a couple of items that Daddy-O can grab in a hurry. He's on his own for a few days now while I'm at a knitting retreat. With a couple of breakfast options in the freezer, I know he won't be hungry in the mornings.

I baked applesauce muffins which I have made many times. They freeze well. I popped them into the freezer, two to a pint-size freezer ziplock bag. He can take out one pack for breakfast or a snack when he wants something. And because they are packed in "twos," he won't need to thaw out the others until he's ready.

And after applesauce muffins, I made "egg muffins." I made a version of these once with vegetable and remember Daddy-O saying, "These are good. But they'd be better if they had some meat in them." So this sausage/egg/cheese recipe sounded like what he wanted.

These can be eaten as is, or you can smash them flat and tuck into a toasted English muffin or a biscuit. Kind of like homemade fast food!

EGG "MUFFINS"

1 lb turkey sausage (I used pork sausage)
6 large eggs
1 cup egg whites (from 7 large eggs)
1/4 cup minced onion
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Brown sausage until no pink remains. Drain on paper towels. Spray muffin tins with PAM. Divide the cooked sausage, onion and cheeses between the 12 muffin cups.

In a large bowl, combine eggs, egg whites, and salt & pepper. Pour egg mixture over the sausage and cheese in each cup.

Bake 22-25 minutes, until set and lightly browned.

Remove from pan and serve warm. Or, let cook completely on a wire rack and refrigerate or freeze.

To reheat from refrigerated, microwave about 30 seconds. To reheat from frozen, microwave 45-60 seconds. (Microwave ovens vary, so figure out the time for yours.)

To freeze them, I placed the cooled muffins on a sheet of parchment paper on a baking pan. Freeze for 1-2 hours, and then wrap for freezer storage. You might want to set a timer to remind you to go back and bag them up. It's easy to forget.

I put them into packs of two and labeled with thawing instructions. Then after trying out the "thaw from frozen" directions, Daddy-O discovered that it took him about 75 seconds to thaw his.

And in the interest of full disclosure, this is what mine looked like coming out of the oven. There was some overflow. I just trimmed that off as I removed them from the cups and everything was good.