Frittata

Frittata is an Italian-style omelet. Usually spinach, cheese, bacon and such. Often with mushrooms

This frittata is Mexican with Mexican ingredients, a nice big fresh sausage chorizo, increased heat with fresh serrano chile, avocado and tomato, but no Mexican spices, only the herb cilantro

It is the sort of thing we'd make for ski weekends because a large frittata can feed 10 guys breakfast in one go. They were often made thinned down with milk and with some kind of cream soup in a tin, usually mushroom, for additional flavor. Frankly, we didn't know what we were doing but we did it anyway and they always turned out. Those were baked in a large casserole until the eggs set, about a dozen at a time.

The real deal uses stove top heat to cook the bottom of the beaten egg in a pan, and broiler heat to set the top and to melt the cheese such as a toaster oven or a chef's kitchen salamander. The trick, if there is a trick, would be to avoid overcooking the egg. The whole thing goes very quickly this way. It puffs up somewhat as a soufflé.

There are two types of cheese here, Asiago and blu cut in chunks as you see rather than grated. That is to create little pools of melted cheese. 

Sometimes pan frittatas are overturned onto a plate, sometimes overturned again to be right side up but I did not do that. This was loosened from the pan and slid onto a plate.

This is a small pan, 7 inches I believe, but a large frittata, a full dinner with one whole avocado and one whole tomato, half a white onion, and one big fat sausage removed from its casing. 

Tomatoes can go inside, of course, but I like them raw. Tomato with egg is a favorite South American thing. Tomato, onion and hot green chile pepper is salsa cruda except this time larger chunks, This is the same thing as avocado salsa cruda inside an egg omelet with Mexican type sausage chorizo, without Mexican spices cumin and coriander, although cilantro is the leafy portion of of the plant that produces coriander seed. (In Britain they are both coriander)

Frittata

Vegetables are fried in a pan to near doneness. A creamy cheese is daubed here and there in the pan. This creates pockets of creamy cheese sauce within. Eggs are whipped together, here with heavy cream, and poured over and assisted in spreading throughout by lifting and poking and shaking to settle. Then baked on moderate heat for twenty-five minutes. 

It is like a quiche in a pan and it can contain pretty much anything. 

Frittatas are not among my favorite things but that is because I never had one this good. This is the best frittata I've ever eaten and I cannot wait to get back on the rest of it. It is excellent.

The first bite tasted like sugar is added but that is not so, the onions did that, and the bell pepper too. I intended green onion but forgot and used less glamorous more clumsy white onion instead and that made this frittata sweeter than most due to all that caramelization. 

The first time I saw this done at a home in Breckenridge used mostly for skiing. It is a good easy thing for a group. That person used eggs to set a tin of cream of mushroom soup. Not much of a cook at the time, the whole thing looked too wet and I doubted it would work. I did work. And Campbell's cream of mushroom soup is fine for a group of teenagers up skiing who do not know much about food. Don't do that.

Watch Gordon Ramsay do this.

Frittata

Started on stovetop, finished in oven.

NAB, 9th in a series, where the only thing actually new is an attitude toward breakfasts with their customary excess of starches, chiefly potatoes and grains. It is a new consciousness at the incipient stages of sweeping across the nation initiated by yours truly, my own humble self.

The good thing about these is they can be enjoyed with impunity at anytime throughout the day.

If you find yourself stuck at a restaurant with an inflexible menu you can try ordering a la carte a couple of eggs and a hamburger patty without any bun or toast or potatoes. If it must absolutely must come with those things then eat only the egg and the hamburger. You may find it very satisfying. Apart from what you're mum might have taught you, just because you're served something doesn't mean you have to eat it. And if you're still hungry after that, and if you really think about it you probably aren't, then go ahead and order something else that is not a starch. A little more expensive, yes, but it's your health that's of overriding concern here. That is if weight is a concern, then if I may suggest, do as thin people do.

Salmon frittata

It occurred to me yesterday while making the salmon soufflé with lemon sauce that the whole thing would be a lot easier and faster in frittata form and better with a touch of sugar in the lemon sauce. Behold, the Pacific salmon frittata presented as a puffy omelet. Started on the stovetop and finished under the broiler. Warning to the wise, and if not to the wise then at least to the cautious, careful with that broiler. There's only one setting -- high -- so adjust the shelf as necessary, or risk your frittata going all splody and smokey on you. Plus salmon is such a tender flesh, it only needs a minute. The butter / lemon sauce with capers and a scant trace of sugar thickened with corn starch is outstanding, tart, salty, sweet, all at once, ginger, garlic, and fennel from the ceviche liquid, nom nom nom nom nom burp nom nom nom. What can I say? You might prefer something a little more yellow.