Western Breakfast Casserole (for a crowd)

Hello all! We spent Sunday night at my grandparents’ beach house and closed out an amazing summer. My brother fried shrimp and my uncle bought a kite for the kids to fly. There were popsicles and boiled peanuts and time to sit and read while the little people napped. Gosh, it was bliss. 

I was put in charge of an egg casserole for Labor Day breakfast. So, here’s a recipe for breakfast casserole to feed a crowd. I have now made multiple versions of this same recipe, usually in my pretty lazagna dish (pictured, its like 10×14-ish) and it is always a hit. However, it’s perfect for those deep 9×13 pans they sell at Costco and most grocery stores. I have made it with spinach and mushrooms, or lots of cheese and onion, but the western seems to be a crowd favorite. It’s colorful, filling, and perfect on a cool fall morning. 

You can make this for your family and plan to have leftovers for a few days, or make it on the weekend for a larger crowd. I have found this easily serves 8-10 and can be stretched a lot further if you add a little side of fruit or toast. 

The secret to this casserole: the BREAD. I am a carbs person. I love them. I crave them in the morning and have found I don’t feel satisfied without them. Even when I make scrambled eggs and bacon, a piece of toast is close at hand. This casserole is a salute to all the bread lovers out there. So don’t skimp on the bread, and if you can, try and make the casserole the night before so that the bread has plenty of time to soak up all the egg goodness before you bake it the next morning. Whenever I have my mom’s bread, I always use that. This time around I was out so I used Dave’s Killer Bread “White Done Right” since it is a thicker slice and I wanted that to soak up the egg. 

YOU WILL NEED:

• 11 eggs (if your pan seems on the smaller side of 9×13, use 9 or 10 eggs and 2 c milk)
• 2.5 c milk (I prefer whole milk)
• 1.5 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• Approx. 1 c diced peppers
• 1/2 onion, diced
• 1 pound pork, turkey, or venison sausage
• 1.5 c cheese of choice, grated (I prefer sharp cheddar)
• 7 slices of bread 

TO MAKE:

1. Add a small splash of oil or butter to a skillet
2. Start by cooking the sausage, onion, and peppers in the skillet until the peppers and onion are soft and the sausage is cooked through
3. While the sausage mixture cooks, spray 9×13 casserole dish with nonstick spray (I used coconut oil spray)
4. Whisk together eggs, milk, S&P
5. Tear the bread into pieces and line bottom of casserole dish; don’t be super uniform about this! Pieces can overlap so that certain areas are more “bready”…that’s what gives this casserole its glorious texture
6. Add the sausage pepper mixture over the bread
7. Add the grated cheese
8. Pour the egg mixture over the top of the casserole, making sure it is evenly distributed over the bread
9. Cover and leave in fridge until ready to bake (I usually make it the night before and bake the following morning)
10. Bake uncovered at 375 for 45 minutes, or until the center no longer appears uncooked
11. The casserole will puff up and look like a mix between a frittata and a fluffy croissant (the picture above); that’s when you know it’s perfect!
12. Allow to cool and set for 10 minutes

Hope you all get a chance to try this! Like I said, if you aren’t feeding a crowd, just serve it to your family and reheat the leftovers in the microwave all week 🙂 It’s good for 5 days