Potato, Smoked Salmon, Red Onion, Caper, Cream Cheese and Roasted Garlic aka My Favorite Bagel As A Pizza (Pizza Night!)

When the orthodontist told me that both kids needed braces, I didn't make the connection that I would be missing out on my bagel fix.  I mean, would you?
With 75% of the household unable to chew through a proper bagel, I had to get creative.  Sure, I flew home to get a decent everything bagel with lox, capers, and red onion see my entire family of origin when we were in the same time zone for a couple of days.  But that's not a realistic long term solution for the craving.

If the everything bagel as a delivery device is temporarily out of reach, I turned to pizza.  I thought the pizza would need something of substance to <gently> chew through, and my farm share had adorable potatoes (Ok, eye of the beholder, I'll give you that), so I consulted this recipe to get the pre-boil/pre-bake technique.  The side effect of this technique is that you can finish the pizza (second baking) without parchment.  Less chance of burning your arm while shaking the pizza off the parchment paper onto the stone.
My son and I, the lox/caper/red onion/cream cheese fans in the family, loved this pizza.  I think it would be even better if I used a tablespoon of the everything bagel seasoning mix I've seen (onion, garlic, sesame seed, poppy seed, etc) while making the dough.  But I tend not to have poppy seeds in the house (one glaring exception!) so I didn't have any.

Yakisoba--Farm Fresh Feast Style (Quick Take)

Recipe for vegetables and meat tossed with noodles and sauce for a kid friendly Japanese dish.

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If you wander through an outdoor festival in Japan, you can see women fixing a delicious stir fried noodle dish, yakisoba, on giant flat griddles.  Because of these unwitting cooking demonstrations, yakisoba is one of the Japanese dishes I'm comfortable making.

I stock up on yakisoba noodle packs when I am near an Asian market.  In Hawaii I could get them fresh, but here in Ohio I get them in the frozen section of the Asian market down the street from hockey in Cincinnati.  Don't ask. I don't usually arrange my children's sports around my food shopping, it just works out that way. :)

I originally had celery in here, but decided there was enough crunch with the Bok Choy and Daikon.

I'm pretty sure my kids developed a taste for it in utero, because they have loved it from the chicken nugget age.  When I get the right mix of veggies in the farm share (some sort of cabbage, carrots, celery or pepper, and onion) it is their lunch of choice.  Yes, my kids come home from school for lunch.  At least my son is easily persuaded to join us if yakisoba is on the menu.  Oh!  Because it's Japanese, give equal emphasis to each syllable:  yah-kee-so-bah.  Easy!

For more recipes using bok choy, please see my Bok Choy Recipes Collection. For more recipes using carrots, please see my Carrot Recipes collection. For more recipes using radishes, please see my Radish Recipes Collection. These collections are part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me starting at the contents of a big box of fresh farm share vegetables and wondering how we're going to get the family to eat them. For more recipe ideas, follow me on Pinterest. For a peek at scenes of life, follow me on Instagram. For articles that caught my eye and epic failures because I have my share, follow me on Facebook. Want to know How to Use This Blog?

Apple Cider Forgot-The-Sugar Muffins

It's apple season!  I love having apples on hand because they store in my crisper longer than, say, berries.  I can toss them in smoothies, side dishes, or just slice them up with peanut butter for a snack.
I used to be very 'meh' about apples, thinking they mostly tasted the same, until I got my first CSA farm share apples from the Shenandoah valley.  Whoa!  What a taste revelation!  The best variety was Larry (I am not making this up) and I'd pay good money to bite into a Larry apple again.  One of the things I miss the most about that first farm share.

These muffins I kind of threw together for an after school snack while I was gathering ingredients for dinner and doing laundry and plotting out the afternoon drive schedule and a bunch of other things.

So I forgot the sugar.

I didn't even notice until I bit into one, and thought 'hey, this isn't really sweet' but when my daughter grabbed the wild violet jelly and I grabbed the apple butter to slather on top, I didn't miss it at all. I mean, with a shake of cinnamon sugar on top, and apple cider for the liquid, they are sweet enough. If you are a person watching your sugar intake-try these!  If you're not, try them with jam or apple butter.

Caramelized Onion, Fresh Pear, Goat Cheese and Sausage Pizza (Pizza Night!)

I love fruit and cheese plates.  So does my daughter--I still remember when as a kindergartener she ordered one as an appetizer.  So much for encouraging independence!  The bill!
The pairing of fresh pears and goat cheese is classic, and I had so much fun making this pear pizza, but you know there was another half of the pig pear left when I finished.  Since I'd had a hard time deciding between a sweet and a savory base for that pizza, I made the combination again and this time did it savory using a mess of caramelized onions that I'd made in the crock pot.  I also brought in my trusty guest photographer to make artistic 'action' shots.  Because it's Friday Night Pizza Night!

Even though both pizzas had the same type of dough base, and 2 of the same toppings, the results were completely different.  And delicious.  I threw a bit of sausage (from part of a leftover breakfast sausage patty) onto this, but you could leave it off if you desire.  I've loved fruit on savory pizzas since I lived in Germany, and now I'm looking around to see what else I could put on a pizza.  Grapes on a chicken pizza fennel focaccia?  Apples, bacon and cheddar? Peaches and pepperoni? What do you think? Check out my Visual Pizza Recipe Index for all of the pizza doughs, fruit pizzas, meat pizzas, and vegetarian pizzas I share each week on the blog.

Simple Sautéed Chinese Cabbage--Thursday Quick Take

This is a simple dish, true, but feeding the family day after day doesn't have to be elaborate.  Sometimes a simple side is just what's needed.

I love appliances.  I can be gone from the house from 4 to 6:30 pm and still sit down for dinner--including a fresh vegetable from the CSA farm share--at 6:45.
Earlier in the day I'd sautéed some chunks of chicken breast and tossed them into a crock pot along with a bottle of Thai red curry sauce.  I started a pot of brown Basmati rice in the rice cooker. Then I actually turned on the crock pot on to low and left for my chauffeuring duties.  While I was out I was pondering a side.  I could slice up some veggies with dip.  Or reheat the leftover creamed chard.  Then I remembered we'd gotten a Chinese cabbage the day before in the farm share box.  All set!  I got home, preheated the skillet while I was chopping the onions and slicing the cabbage, and we would have sat down to eat 15 minutes later.  We didn't, for another 30 minutes, because my son decided to take the dog for an extra long walk.  At least the dog didn't get loose, like that other time.

Simple Sautéed Chinese Cabbage

1/2 medium onion, finely chopped (about 1/2 cup)
1 head Chinese cabbage, sliced into 1/2 inch-ish slices (separate the mostly stem from the mostly leaf)
Crazy Janes Mixed Up Salt (or salt and pepper) to taste
1 Tablespoon butter or cooking oil of your choice

Preheat a large skillet over medium heat.  Add a turn of oil.  Sauté the onion 3-5 minutes until it begins to soften.  Add the thicker stems of the cabbage, sauté and additional 5 minutes.  Add in the cabbage leaves and sauté 3-5 minutes until wilted.  Shake a bunch of Crazy Janes over top, and finish by letting a pat of butter melt over the dish.

Beef and Bok Choy Pie

The inspiration for this pie came from my family's love of pasties (the Cornish hand held meat pie) combined with my interest in tourtiere (the Canadian meat pie), coupled with a pile of bok choy from the CSA farm share and a freezer full of cow.  The result is very tasty (there was fighting over the leftovers).  Definitely a keeper.  I bet you could swap the bok choy for Swiss chard, tat soi, collard greens, or kohlrabi.  I stopped short of calling this a pot pie-the filling was moist but not really gravy-like.  If you are not lucky enough to live near a Penzey's, look near the chicken stock/vegetable broth aisle for jars of spoonable soup base.  It really makes the dish.

Broccoli Rabe, Mushroom, Roasted Garlic Pizza with Fresh Mozzarella and Fresh Tomato Sauce (Pizza Night!)

I hate to waste edible food.  When I get greens from the farm share, I prefer to use the entire stem.  You will rarely find me using a recipe that calls for, say, discarding Swiss chard stems.  But when I read in the farm share newsletter that the stems of broccoli rabe (adorable how spell checker changes this to 'broccoli rage') could be used like asparagus, I decided to use the rest (leaves and florets) in a pizza.  With mushrooms, because I think they have that whole 'earthy' thing going on together.

As usual, I couldn't decide between sauces for the base.  So this recipe uses an amazing tomato pesto sauce recipe I got from Heather at In Her Chucks.  The sauce is so light and fresh that I kept the toppings simple and it turned out pretty good if I do say so myself.

Oh, and what did I do with the stems of the broccoli rabe?  I chopped them up, nuked them, and added them to tuna casserole.  I do not recommend doing that.  While they tasted fine, it ruined the familiar homey comforting that you expect from tuna casserole.  Luckily my son ate all the leftovers.

JEN's Divine Turkey Divan aka Rice Casserole--Thanksgiving Leftover Remake

Why yes, I did take this.  While snorkeling at Hanauma Bay. Thank you.  I think it rocks, too.

It's not that difficult, once you get into it, to eat seasonally when you live in a place that has actual seasons.  And, I suppose, it's not that difficult when you eat from the farm share all year 'round, even though you're only picking up goodies from mid-May through Thanksgiving (if you're lucky!).

But what happens when you don't live in a place that has real seasons?  How can you look forward to the comforting soups and stews of winter, to heating up the kitchen baking bread, to enjoying your favorite casseroles when it's paradise all year 'round?

I lived in Hawaii for more than 3 years.  I lived there long enough to notice the subtle changes in season--the times when the mango tree next to my daughter's preschool littered the parking lot with ripe fruit, the times when it was a little hotter than usual because the trade winds had slowed down, the times when the surf on the North Shore was so awe-inspiring we'd drive up just to watch it.  (And eat garlicky shrimp from the shrimp truck, but that's another post).

It was hard for me to get in the mood to cook heavy 'winter' dishes.  Frankly, it was more fun to go out for a big holiday meal, because roasting a turkey and all the trimmings when it's in the 80s is just . . . wrong.

Don't misunderstand--I loved living in Hawaii and loved raising my little kids there.  Even though my spouse considers it a honeymoon [Me:  I want to go on a honeymoon.  We never went on a honeymoon.  Spouse:  I took you to Hawaii for 3.5 years.  Me:  I was changing diapers for most of that time.  If you're changing diapers it's not a honeymoon. Spouse:   (the sound of crickets, cuz he knows he's got no response)] it was a great experience and one I will treasure forever.

There is one fall/winter casserole type meal that I did cook during our time in Hawaii--this dish.  The official name of this recipe is Turkey Divan, but my family just calls it Rice Casserole (if you've had little kids, you can see how it got it's name).  My friend JEN brought it to a gathering long ago, and I got the recipe and made it soon after.  When the kids were little, I'd blend up the cooked casserole and mix it with rice, hence our family nickname for it, but now they are old enough to eat it as is.
It's a great way to turn leftover turkey into a totally different dish!

Shepherd's Pie--Thanksgiving Leftover Remake

I hate to throw out food, so I am grateful for a family who willingly eats leftovers for lunch or, when we've got enough, for Leftover Night.  When I can turn leftovers into something completely different, it's a bonus.  When I can use 3 different leftovers in one new dish, it's a hat trick.

Making this the other night I scored a Leftover Hat Trick.  I had leftover mashed potatoes, from this dish.  I had leftover green beans, simply sautéed with a bit of bacon.  And my kid wanted grilled cheese and tomato soup for lunch so I had half a can (prepared) of tomato soup left.

I did what any self-respecting frugal home cook would do.  I combined them all to make Shepherd's pie!  This may not be the Shepherd's pie of your childhood, but it very nearly is the shepherd's pie of mine, so try it.  You may like it!

My kids are not fans of green beans, but will eat them in this dish and take the obligatory bite of the World's Best Green Bean Casserole (they are even more non-fans of mushrooms than they are of green beans).  For them, I chop the beans pretty small in my shepherd's pie.

If I were feeding green bean and mushroom lovers, I'd try to combine the entire leftover WBGBC with the ground beef and seasonings--without the soup--top it with leftover mashed potatoes, and call it Post-Thanksgiving Shepherd's Pie.  But for now, I'll stick with simply prepared beans and be happy when I hit the jackpot and the leftovers are as good as the original dishes they came from.

Try this if you happen to have 3 or 4 cups of leftover mashed potatoes, 1 1/2 to 2 cups of leftover green beans, and a can of tomato soup in the pantry.

What are your favorite ways to remake Thanksgiving leftovers into new meals?

Sweet Potato Pizza--2 ways--Thanksgiving Leftover Remake (Pizza Night!)

Sometimes the veggies you get from the farm share aren't . . . perfect looking.  Sometimes they are knobby, misshapen, tiny, weird (carrot pants!).  And that's ok.  They still taste fine.  I'd had an idea to try sweet potato fries with our meal, but these were the remaining sweet potatoes I'd gotten from the farm share.  Not really idea for cutting into fairly uniform slices so they'd bake evenly.  Instead, I cubed them up, added oil, salt, and pepper, and roasted them at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for about 15-20 minutes.  Faster than I was expecting.

Then I went to pick up my farm share and got another batch of sweet potatoes.  These were fat and sassy and perfect for the fries I wanted to make.  So I had leftover roasted sweet potato cubes, and you know what that means:  PIZZA!

This is version 1.

I was inspired by the sweet potato and feta combination I saw here, but also dithering about feta vs goat cheese, what type of sauce, additional vegetables, yada yada.  So I opted to make 2 pizzas, like I did with the fresh pear and goat cheese combo.  But the sweet potato pizzas were similar enough, and not OMG FREAKING AMAZING like the tomato pesto pizza I'd made the week before (yes, the post will come up, but tomatoes are not seasonal to me now so it just feels wrong to titillate you when you may not be able to access fresh delicious tomatoes.  You'll thank me.  Maybe?).

So I've decided to post them both, and to invite you dear readers to try this at home, with your leftover Thanksgiving sweet potatoes, and see if you can come up with something with a little more oomph than my pizzas had.  Because while these pizzas were fine, and the entire family ate them, they needed some sisu.  Some chutzpah.  A certain je ne sais quoi.  Something was missing.  My spouse says bacon.  It's his answer to everything.  Unfortunately I used the last of the bacon in a Chicken Cider Stew and he'll have to wait until I remember to thaw and bake some.

That said, on to the pizzas.  **But please check out the update at the end!  There's hope!**

Silken Turnip and Potato Soup (and How To Make Chicken Stock)

Wrinkled old turnips?  Come on down! We love using you in soup!

I read this recipe in The Washington Post and first tried it when the farm share overwhelmed me with turnips provided us with an overabundance of turnips.  My whole family likes this.  I'm happy to make it earlier in the week and serve it the night before Thanksgiving, when I'm busy prepping and don't feel like cooking or eating a heavy meal.

Awaiting the sour cream garnish.

This soup tastes very rich, but it's made without any cream.  In fact, if you use vegetable broth and oil instead of the chicken stock and butter, it would make a vegan offering on your Thanksgiving table.
I don't usually have vegans at my table, so I make chicken stock for the base of this soup.  Whenever I roast a chicken, or pick up a rotisserie chicken at the store, I save the carcass for chicken stock.  Today I grabbed a soup pack and, armed with 1950 Betty Crocker's New Picture Cookbook, made up a batch.

Swiss Chard, Corn, and Feta Pizza (Pizza Night!)

This pizza was inspired by a flatbread at SmittenKitchen.  The combination of leeks, corn, and chard sounded just delicious.  I haven't gotten any leeks from my CSA farm share this year, though.  So I knew I'd need to sub in some onions.  I grew up eating the entire piece of Swiss chard, and I hate to waste edible food, so I adapted it based on what I had on hand.
I'd been experimenting making pizza sauce with fresh tomatoes, so I smeared half the pizza with the sauce that didn't get put up (I ran out before I finished).  Half of this pizza is <gasp> naked!  It's ok, though, I covered up the bare dough with stuff.  It's totally safe for kids.

You don't normally see fluorescent pink in nature.

Quick and Crunchy Multi Grain Pumpkin Muffins

The overnight soaked-oatmeal muffins only work if you remember to set them up overnight, or at least an hour before baking.  Somedays, though, you remember to thaw a cup of pumpkin puree but forget to soak the oats.  And forget to put a tea bag in your mug of hot water . . .

For those days, here's a quick and crunchy muffin with the same whole grain goodness in less time.

French Green Lentil Soup (and How to Make Brown Stock, Frugal Farm Fresh Feast Style)

You know how I keep yammering on about saving all the unused bits and pieces of your farm share veggies in a Soup Pack?  Today I'm going to show you how I use a soup pack to make a brown (beef) stock, then use some of that stock to make soup.

This soup got started with the cow taking up residence in my freezer.  I asked for all the odds and ends of the beast, from tongue to tail and odd bits in between.  We got several packages of "soup bones" and today I got one out, along with a soup pack.  Instead of randomly throwing ingredients and insufficient salt into the pot, like I usually do, I decided to <gasp!> follow a recipe.  Well, loosely.

I consulted my handy 1950 Betty Crocker's New Picture Cookbook.  I was interested to read "Store covered in jars in the refrigerator.  The layer of fat on top will help preserve the stock." I usually freeze soup stock, and at this time of year freezer space is at a premium, so I gave it a go.  I heated the jars as if I was going to can the stock, then poured the strained (ooh!  used my cheesecloth! bonus!) stock into the hot jars.  I used my plastic screw top lids since they work in the fridge or freezer.  When I was ready to make soup I scooped off the fat layer (reminded me of my mom's wax on top of jam) and poured out the stock.

A Pizza Primer

If you've never made pizza dough from water, flour, yeast, and salt--grab a cup of tea, coffee, or hey we all need to drink more water so grab some and read on.  If you make pizza already, you know what you're doing so just enjoy the photos or move along to your next blog if you're busy.

The other week I showed you how I turn a ball of pizza dough into a crust, ready for topping.  Today, thanks to the miracle of it's-still-football-marching-band-season-so-I'm-really-doing-this-on-Sunday-afternoon, I will show you how I make that ball of pizza dough.  It is so simple, you've got to try this at home!

I tend to float between crust recipes, getting stuck on one for a while before switching it up.  I think my current recipe came from Pioneer Woman.  I got sick of looking it up each time and just emailed myself the particulars in February of 2011.  Though looking up the email date referred me to a pizza dough email from King Arthur flour from Feb 2002 . . . good grief I've been making pizza for a long time.

Still love this white spinach pizza the most.

Sweet Potato (Leftover Halloween) Reese's Pieces Oatmeal Cookies

One of the nice things about seasonal eating is looking forward to the new produce that ripens with each season.  It must have been boring just buying whatever I had on the menu plan at the grocery store (who am I kidding? I think I've always shopped for what's on sale/marked down/cheap).  Lately, I have been busily roasting a bunch of the fall produce that's been popping up in my CSA farm share box.  I know that the greens need to be used up quicker than the winter squash and root veggies, but I've missed the root veggies, so I had to include them in my processing labors.

I am frugal by nature, and always looking for ways to save money.  I don't mind asking my kids for some of their Halloween candy, and they don't mind tolerate giving me some when I use it to make treats for all of us!  Today I was going to make a batch of cookies for the family using that candy, and my eye fell on a cup of baked sweet potato flesh that was left over from another recipe.  I'm happy adding veggies to my oatmeal muffins so why not cookies?  I love to make cookies because I bought into that 'let the dough sit' NYT article.  Since it only takes a few minutes to mix up a batch of dough, I'm happy to do it whenever I've got softened butter (yay, hockey season!). Then the dough can hang out in the fridge for a day until I'm ready to bake.  Win for everyone.

Don't try this at home!  See note below!

One technique I have for keeping our family from eating 3 dozen cookies in a day is to freeze scoops of cookie dough on a metal tray until hard, then transfer to a zip top bag.  That way I can bake as much as I want think we should eat for dessert.  And the side benefit is that I frequently have cookie dough in the freezer for unexpected cookie needs.  Long ago I'd promised dinner, ready to heat, to my son's Thursday after school music tutor when he and his wife became parents.  Except I'd gotten the date wrong!  Lucky for me, I had cookies in the freezer, so while the music lesson was happening in the dining room, I was in the kitchen baking cookies and throwing together a meal for the new parents.  A well-stocked pantry is a huge help to my wallet.

Fresh Pear, Fig Jam, and Goat Cheese Pizza (Pizza night!)

When I saw the pig-shaped pear (or is that a pear-shaped pig?) I wanted to put it on a pizza.
The pear, I mean.
And pears go great with goat cheese--so another layer of flavor was there.

What I couldn't decide was what else would go on the pizza.  I love goat cheese and fig jam, but I wanted to try something more savory like caramelized onions with the pear.  I was mulling this over when I went on my near-daily milk run, and asked the cheese monger at my local grocery store for advice.  She echoed my fig jam thoughts.

So I did what any good food blogger, even a very new food blogger, would do.  I made a bunch of pizzas and took separate photos of each so that I can pull multiple Farm Fresh Feasts Friday Night Pizza Night posts out of one meal!  Tonight's pizza is the fresh pear, fig jam, and goat cheese version.

I had help on this undertaking.  My kid decided to help out with photography so I didn't have to keep washing my hands in between steps.  She was taking "action" shots of the pizza.  Some of them I really really like.  I took the ones at the end that are less artistic but do let you see the entire pizza.

Action shot-pears, goat cheese, and jam.

Roasted Butternut Squash and Alfredo Sauce with Fried Sage

I am always looking to my fridge, to the leftover bits of this and that, for inspiration for the next meal.  This quick side dish is no exception.  I had leftover prepared Alfredo sauce from this pizza, and leftover roasted butternut squash from these enchiladas.  And I needed a side dish for this casserole.  I also had lovely fresh sage from the farm share, and have been reading about sage cooked in butter added to all sorts of butternut squash dishes.  It's not hard to see how inspiration struck. Easy cleanup-too!  I cooked this all in one pot, doing first the noodles, then the sage, then finally the sauce before combining it all back in the pot to heat through.

I've revamped my Visual Recipe Index! For more ideas on what to do with your butternut squash, click here.

Butternut Squash and Caramelized Onion Enchilada Casserole

Could have called it enchilada-lasagna, or enchi-sanga, but in the end I went with a straightforward name. This dish takes all the ingredients of enchiladas, but instead of rolling each tortilla up individually, I stacked them in the dish and spread the stuffing over the whole mess.

I know, food porn, right?  This was a particularly photogenic dish, if you're into melty-cheesy goodness.  It ought to be-I made it twice before I was happy with it, so there are photos from each preparation.  My fault, not the recipe--my homemade salsa-not-quite-verde wasn't the right sauce. I repeated it with canned enchilada sauce and it was just right.

My first time trying real, homemade, enchiladas was at a baby shower of all places.  Our hostess made cheese and onion enchiladas and I was amazed how soft and flexible the corn tortilla became in the warm sauce.  Up until that point, I'd assumed that corn tortillas were good for tortilla chips and that's about it.  Not anymore!  I loved the combination of cheese and onion then, and it's still my favorite kind of enchiladas by far.

Because I eat seasonally, I've got butternut squash from my farm share.  The farmers at the weekly pick up said there'd been some insect damage to the squash, and to eat them up this week.  Normally I'd be holding off on the squash until later in the fall and focusing on the greens now, but needs must.  I decided to roast the squash because I've been roasting anything I haven't pickled lately (and pickling anything that hasn't moved). I've revamped my Visual Recipe Index! For more ideas on what to do with your butternut squash, click here.

The pig is very concerned he's going to get pickled too.

Red Russian Kale, Tomato, and Eggs Baked in Ham Cups

My mother, myself, most of her best buds from her first job (pre-marriage, pre-kids, when she was Just Herself), and most of the daughters of these women gathered for a weekend in St Louis.  A reunion for the moms, in some cases a first meeting for the daughters.


It is a gift, to hear all about your mom from her friends, when your mom is sitting right next to you.


Three of us daughters got that gift.  Our hostess, Alanna, did not.  Instead, she selflessly created the opportunity for her mother's friends to reminisce about the one member of their group who is no longer with us.  It was a very special weekend.

Alanna, of Kitchen Parade and A Veggie Venture, is a clever Foodie.  She arranged for our meals to be catered by Karen of Family Style Food.  So a bunch of women who all enjoy delicious food got to sit back, relax, visit, and be treated to fabulous dishes like the one I'm writing about today.

This dish was inspired by Karen's Individual Prosciutto, Spinach, and Egg Pies.  I loved it at that weekend, begged for the recipe, and have made it on many occasions since.  It's great for a weekend brunch, a weeknight dinner, even a PTA teacher appreciation breakfast!  Extra veggies without bread products are always appreciated on a breakfast spread.

I usually don't have baby spinach, the original veggie.  But many other greens from the farm share or the garden or the farmer's market will work--Swiss chard, Tat soi, or the Red Russian kale used here to name a few.

The original recipe uses prosciutto, but I had a fair amount of ham slices on hand so I decided to forgo a trip to the grocery store and use what I got.  Frugality!

If you happen to have 4 sizes of muffin tins like I do, let's start a support group use the second largest.  It's larger than a standard muffin tin (7/8 ounce vs 3/8 ounce). If you only have the standard muffin tin, just use a little bit less of everything but the egg.