Bagel Breakfast Strata? Sure, why not?!
So I had a couple of forgotten everything bagels and a neglected tub of chive cream cheese that were begging to be used. This rainy Sunday morning, inspiration struck! What if I made these into a breakfast strata? For those not in the know (or younger than 50) , a breakfast strata is a baked eggy, custardy, brunchy kind of casserole thing that uses cubed bread as a base.
I love bagels. The chewy salty outside of a well-made, REAL bagel is sublime. But not nearly as perfect without a cream cheese partner. I could have simply used the bagels mixed with the eggs and other stuff here, but incorporating the cream cheese as well was simply irresistible. Might just be crazy enough to work.
How to add the cream cheese though? Mix it in with the eggs and milk? Spread it on top after baking? There had to be an answer…then it hit me. Keep it simple stupid!
Heat up the oven to 350. Grease up a baking dish, I used 9×13. Spread cream cheese on a couple of bagel halves, I don’t care what kind of either one you use. Stick the 2 halves together and then chop them up into cube sizes. Toss those into the baking dish with whatever other stuff you want or need to use up. I added chopped red and yellow peppers, a handful of spinach, sausage, some purple onion and a small can of diced green chiles. Then I mixed up some eggs and (almond) milk with salt and pepper and poured that right into the baking dish (you need enough of the egg mix to saturate everything). Mix it all together until everything is moist. At this point you can cover this and let it sit in the refrigerator for a while so the bagels soften up a bit to make it more custardy. Even leave it overnight. I baked mine right away the first time because I’m impatient and it was fine, but letting it sit for at least an hour before baking was better. Bake until done ( eggs set, not runny, brown on top). Let it cool a sec before you cut it. It is good hot, lukewarm or even cold straight from the fridge.
