One of the biggest issues that many of my clients have is breakfast. Not that they don’t like breakfast, but they feel that they don’t have time to eat it, or that they don’t have any options besides breakfast cereal. Eggs, for example, are off of a lot of peoples’ weekday menus because of the time involved in cooking them.
Eating a protein-rich breakfast is really important for mental alertness as well as for satiety, and I want to put eggs back on the menu! A perfect protein in so many ways, eggs can be easy…if you make them in advance. That’s right – you can make these amazing, simple egg muffins in advance and store them in the fridge or freezer where they’re ready when you are. Pop them into the microwave briefly to heat them, and you’re out the door! How fast is that?
There are plenty of egg muffin recipes online, but I figured I would add mine to the mix instead of directing people to everyone else’s recipes. The Critic was happy that I felt this way, because he scarfed down two of these at dinner last night and was super happy to have them for breakfast today too.
I love egg muffins because not only are they convenient, they’re also completely customizable. Add whatever vegetables, cheese, and meat (or not) that you want – there’s no wrong way to do them. Actually, I advise against using tomatoes, because they’re too wet for this recipe and they’ll ruin it. But besides that, there’s no way to do this wrong!
I used an 18-pack of eggs to make this recipe, because I wanted to make the muffins big enough that you’ll be satisfied with just one. I have made these with 12 eggs, but they came out a bit small and underwhelming. I sautéed some tired-looking kale that was hiding in my crisper and added that, as well as some cheddar cheese, and that was my entire recipe. Super easy!
One tip – be sure to grease the muffin tin VERY well, or you’ll be digging your egg muffins out with a knife to free them from the tin. Not fun. Mine came out a bit un-pretty, but they were very tasty!
To put the egg mixture into the muffin tin, I used a large spoon at first, then poured the egg into the tin once the amount became manageable. I still made a bit of a mess as you can see from the photo, but eh, whatever. Making a mess in the kitchen is part of cooking so you’ll need to get over that part if you have issues with it. Plus, it makes for much more interesting photos, like the one below. Too bad I don’t have a photo of The Critic harassing me for the 100th time to clean the kitchen up and stop cooking…sometimes he just wants a clean kitchen for once!
Makes 12 large muffins – the only things that are mandatory here are the eggs and milk – add whatever you like to yours.
18 eggs
½ cup milk
¾ cup cheese
1.5 cup cooked vegetables (I used sautéed kale, and it was 1.5 cups AFTER sautéing)
2/3 cup ham or other meat if you want to use it
Salt and pepper to taste
Butter or other fat for greasing the muffin tin
Preheat the oven to 350F.
Crack all of the eggs into a bowl and add the milk. Whisk until fluffy and combined – you might want to use an actual hand mixer for this instead of a whisk…it’s quite the arm workout!
Grease a muffin tin well – I used butter and in each greased cup, add the mix-ins of your choice. Pour the beaten egg over the mix-ins – fill each cup up to the very top. The eggs will puff up during and immediately after cooking, but will quickly fall once you remove them from the oven..there won’t be any spillover like with actual muffins.
Bake the egg muffins at 350F for around 20-30 minutes, until they’re firm in the centers. Remove and let cool.
Store in the fridge or freezer. An egg muffin with a slice of Ezekiel bread is the perfect breakfast! Enjoy!
