Breakfast Casserole in a Hash Brown Crust

Rain. Rain.

Go away.

Please.

As much as I love watching my garden come alive with all of this rainy weather, I'm also trying to get some outside projects done that are really hard to do in this cruddy weather.  Not hard, like, impossible.  But, hard in the sense that I don't want to be outside working unless it's cloudy and cool.

I'm a very particular girl.  No sun, no rain, no humidity.  I can literally boycott all outdoor activities for days if the weather isn't to my liking.  Sometimes, I get a craving to go out and be in sunshine, but it's pretty rare.  It's the reason that my skin is so pale, it's almost translucent.

But I'm okay with that.

Being inside, I suppose I have some time to do some cleaning.  Probably not, though.

Or, maybe I'll cook something?  Nah.

Most likely, I'm sitting around wondering I never started watching junk TV shows General Hospital until today.  I can't say that these are great works in television history, but it's sure keeping me entertained today.  Plus, I remember hearing about the infamous Luke & Laura romance as I was growing up, but I'd never seen it until today.  I had to search the internet for the backstory as I watched the current soap opera plot unfold.  I want to say that it's a pretty far-fetched story line, but I grew up watching people clone each other on Guiding Light as a kid.

I'm digressing here by quite a bit.

Since I've been cozied up in front of my A/C all day, trying to avoid any reminder that it's raining and muggy and gross outside, I decided to change up my meal routine.

Since I most certainly had cold, leftover pizza for breakfast, I decided to make some breakfast for dinner.

I've seen this hash brown crust on the internet before, mostly used with a variety of quiche-esque ingredients.  I, myself, am not a quiche fan.  First, I don't like the pie crust component.  I could do a crustless quiche, but I feel like that's just a poorly executed omelette.  All the same ingredients, but you have to bake it because you're no good at the omelette folding technique.

My mother has made this breakfast casserole long before Paula Deen was a twinkle in the Food Network's eye.  She has since made it pretty famous, but I've been scarfing down a similar version of this since I grew my first set of teeth.  We didn't have a name for it, but we always scarfed it down on Christmas morning.  It was tradition to have that what's-it-called kind of dish before we opened presents.

Since I don't eat sausage, I tried this with a beef sausage variety and I really liked it.

Plus, eating this on top of a bed of crispy hash browns??

This is likely my new favorite Christmas tradition, even those it's July!












Breakfast Casserole in a Hash Brown Crust

3 large potatoes, shredded

6 slices white bread, cubed

1/2 lb. breakfast chicken or beef sausage

2 tbsp butter

8 eggs

1/2 cup milk

8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese

1 tsp hot sauce

Salt & Pepper to taste

Preheat oven 400F.

Use a grater to shred potatoes into hash browns.  Use a towel to blot excess moisture from the potatoes.

In a large bowl, combine hash browns with one egg.  Press hash browns into the bottom of a greased 9" springform pan.  Press hash browns up the sides of the pan to form a crust.

In a skillet, cook sausage in butter over medium heat until thoroughly browned.

In a large bowl, whisk eggs, milk, hot sauce, salt and pepper together. 

On the hash brown crust, place the cubes of bread, followed by the sausage, then the cheese.  Cover the whole thing with the egg mixture, careful to stay inside the walls of the crust.

Bake at 350F for about 45 minutes or until eggs are set and top is golden brown.