Cheddar Dill Breakfast Quinoa & Brunch with the Girls

Don’t you love when you totally throw something completely random and new together in the kitchen and it ends up being a huge success!?

That’s what happened in this kitchen last weekend.

This time it was breakfast, and I love making breakfast on the weekends so it was fun coming up with something new and different.  If it bombed?  Oh well, it was the weekend and I could make something else :)

We had a container of leftover, cooked quinoa in the fridge.  There was a good amount of it, so I was hoping to incorporate it into breakfast!  I’ve seen various “breakfast quinoas” around the blog world…many times made similar to oatmeal (which I want to try), but I was more in the mood for something savory.

Plus some cheese and fresh herbs make anything better.

I give you…

Cheddar Dill Breakfast Quinoa
serves 2

• 1T olive oil
• 1/4 cup white or yellow onion, diced
• 1/2 – 3/4 cup cooked quinoa (really you can use as much as you want, obviously the texture will change as the ratio of quinoa to egg is altered).
• 3 eggs
• splash of milk (about 2T)
• salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup cheddar cheese, grated
• 1T fresh chopped dill

In a non-stick skillet heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add onion and sauté for 3-5 minutes, until just getting soft.  Add in quinoa, and continue to sauté for another 2-4 minutes. 

In a small bowl, crack in eggs and beat together with a fork.  Add milk and beat that into the eggs.  Pour eggs into quinoa mixture.  Season with a little salt and pepper.  After about 30 seconds, start to scramble mixture together.  Add in dill.  Continue to cook/scramble.  Once eggs are just about done to the point where you like your scramble eggs cooked, add in cheese.  Give another stir and remove from heat.

We had ours with some bacon and sides of yogurt with a sauce of cooked down berries (plus some lemon juice and maple syrup) and walnuts.

Iced latte

We both LOVED the quinoa!!  I think I liked the texture even more than regular scrambled eggs.  Plus the possibilities are endless for flavors…different cheeses, herbs, spices, veggies.  The beauty of breakfast egg dishes :)

Try this!!

Keeping with a breakfast theme…I’d also like to share some photos from a brunch I had at my place with a few of my girl friends.  You know how sometimes there are friends or groups of friends that you just don’t see as often as you’d like or used to see?  Well that was my problem.  So to solve it I just invited them over one Sunday morning for a quick and delightful brunch!

I was excited to do a “girly” table setting with some pink linens.

I love using baskets and trays to group my centerpieces

I actually was too busy prepping food and chatting that I forgot to snap some photos before we ate!!  But I grabbed a few after…much of the food is gone but you get the gist.

Smoked Salmon/Capers/Cream Cheese/Red Onion/Mini Whole Wheat Bagels.

This is an easy one.  No cooking involved and you can present it as nice and you want! 

One of my friends brought this zucchini bread…and now I need the recipe!  It was amazing!!

So moist and it created this awesome crust around the edges.

Bacon, fresh pineapple, a coffee cake brought by another friend

My favorite brunch dish to make for a group…French Toast Strata!

A delicious frittata…

• This one started with butter in the skillet, then lots of thinly sliced onions…caramelize.
• Once mostly caramelized, add in chopped zucchini.  Sauté for a couple more minutes.
• Then add eggs (think I used 6 eggs, beaten + some milk)
•   Add in chopped fresh thyme.  Then top with LOTS of goat cheese.
• Broil for a few minutes (be sure to use an oven safe skillet!  I love using cast iron), until set and just starting to brown.

More fruit!

Baskets also useful for condiments (salt, pepper, maple syrup) and cream and sugar for coffee.  

I like to use some of my real creamers/pitchers for cream and maple syrup.  It’s not much more effort and looks so nice!

Brunch was  a success.  Caught up with friends, and then we all still had the rest of the day to get our Sunday-type errands done :)

I heart breakfast food.