Italian Frittata Recipe
Italian Frittata Recipe
Your Nugget of Nutritional Info for this post:
Basil is the high-lite of this tasty bite. An aromatic herb from the mint family, it's good for more than just pesto...it's good for you! It contains phytochemicals and essential oils found in many, such stinky herbs
Italian large-leaf basil--the most commonly used variety--acquires its odor from a combination of linalool and methyl chavicol oils, and defends your body against bacteria and fungi. An anti-inflammatory that promotes cardiovascular health, as well, it's virtually calorie-free at just 7 calories per TBSP, and is a delicious source for vitamin K, zinc, calcium, magnesium, potassium and fiber.
The Results!
The Ingredients:
Recipe in Rebus:
Cook Time
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 5 min
Ready in: 30 min
Yields: serves 2
Ingredients
- 5 eggs, free range and cage free
- ½ cup ricotta
- ¼ cup heavy cream
- 4 slices provolone cheese
- ¼ cup Parmesan
- ½ cup croutons, Italian Style
- 2 tomatoes
- 4-6 cloves garlic
- 1 medium shallot
- ¼ cup basil
- ¼ cup oregano
- 2 pats butter, or butter substitute
- 2 TBSP. olive oil
How to Do It:
- Place croutons in a plastic bag, and crush coarsely with meat mallet. (a food processor renders the croutons too pulverized) Set aside.
- Gather your shallots and garlic, and mince, keeping separate. Set aside.
- Clean herbs, mince, and set aside. It doesn't matter if these get mixed up.
- Seed and dice tomatoes, and set aside.
- Time to make the egg mixture! Crack 5 eggs, but use only 3 of the whites. Mix together and pour into mixing bowl.
- Add cream.
- Add ricotta and mix well.
- Heat butter and oil to sizzling in pan.
- Add shallots first, and cook until near translucent.
- Add garlic, and cook 1-2 minutes longer.
- Pour egg mixture into pan, and turn heat down to medium.
- As egg mixture cooks, gently work the edges with spatula to ensure it doesn't stick. You'll need to intermittently prick the center of the frittata with a fork, as well, to keep moving the uncooked portion of the mixture to the bottom. Do this delicately, to guarantee wholeness of final product
- Once the egg mixture starts to gel a bit, layer the provolone slices onto it.
- Sprinkle herbs evenly.
- Add tomatoes in the same fashion.Once the frittata is almost set, showing only a small portion of runny egg mixture on top--
- Sprinkle Parmesan, and then--
- Sprinkle crushed croutons.
- Place under broiler to finish. This only takes a second of zapping, and honestly? I'd reverse the layering order of Parmesan and croutons, so that the cheese protects the croutons from burning. (you live and you learn!)
- Remove and cut into pie-like sections.
- Add corn cakes, or home-style potatoes, and you've got yourself a yummy dish for breakfast, lunch or dinner!
Cut like a pie into slices!
