The First of Many Posts Encouraging Bacon

This past weekend I went to Philadelphia to visit my oldest and best-est friend Liz. She picked up a great cookbook at Terrain and we made a frittata inspired by one of its recipes. Delicious as it was, it still wasn't the enormous Amish cinnamon roll we had eaten Saturday morning (or the indescribably delicious Amish bacon we fried up to go with it).

Oh, also, sorry for the minimal pictures. After the vegetables started cooking I got super distracted with eating bacon and watching Downton Abbey.


Asparagus, Corn and Potato Frittata with Goat Cheese
Adapted from One of Liz's Cookbooks.

Butter (about 2 tbsp)
4-5 small red or yellow fingerling potatoes
1 shallot
1 bunch asparagus
2 ears of corn
4-5 green onions
10-12 eggs
5-7 oz. goat cheese
Salt
Pepper
Dill


1. Melt about 1 tbsp butter in a large, oven-proof sauce pan or skillet. Or, if you're me and Liz, skip the butter and cook up some nice, fatty bacon (no turkey or soy bacon); leave the grease in the pan and snack on the bacon as you proceed. Also, at this time, preheat your oven to Broil and move one oven rack up to only a few inches below the broiler.

2. Dice potatoes and mince shallots. Add potatoes to the buttered (or greased) pan and allow to cook for a bit. When they begin to color add the shallots. Salt and pepper to taste. Cook together until the potatoes are crispy on the outside but still soft on the inside (think home fries). If shallots begin to burn that's fine, just remove them from the pan.

3. Add green onions, corn, and asparagus to pan. Cook all vegetables together for 3-5 minutes; nothing should be burning, but everything should be well-heated and the flavors should be blended.

4. Remove vegetables from pan and into a large bowl. If there are burned bits stuck to the pan, clean it out by wiping down with a paper towel. Add beaten eggs to vegetables (I gave a range here because it will depend on how many veggies you end up using how much egg you'll need to hold it all together; we used 2 cups of egg whites for ours but Liz insists a yolk or two would have been a useful addition). Return mixture to buttered pan (break out the other tbsp here) and set on medium heat. Salt and pepper to taste. Dot chunks of goat cheese on top of the frittata and push down slightly so that they become incorporated.

5. Cook for at least 8 minutes or until the edges of the frittata begin to pull away from the pan. If it seems like the bottom may be cooking too quickly (though I'm not sure how you'd be able to tell) feel free to turn down the heat. Once the edges have puffed out, remove pan from stove-top and transfer into oven. Allow frittata to continue to cook in the oven until desired doneness; the recipe we were using called for only a minute, but since we had increased the proportions of veggies and eggs, ours ended up needing to stay in for more like 6 minutes. The moral is, make sure you watch it and whenever it looks like it's done, then it's done. Ta-da!

Tips and Tricks
- This, like many cheaper, easier meals, is very open to interpretation. Nearly any spices + veggies + eggs = frittata goodness. Subbing out asparagus for broccoli or adding tomatoes or anything else that might be more in line with your tastes or what's available at the market is A-OK.
- Though we didn't do it here, a jalapeno might have been a nice addition.

Serving/Pricing info: Frankly, I have no idea. The recipe originally calls this a 4-serving dish, but depending on your appetite it could easily be 6 or even 8 servings. Also Liz bought the ingredients so I can't say for sure how much this ended up costing, but if you shop vegetables on special this could very well be under $3/serving.

How was it? Really, really good. We ended up eating ours rolled up inside fresh tortillas with chunky, spicy salsa but this is also great on its own.