LOCAL WEDNESDAYS*: SPINACH GOAT CHEESE FRITTATA

       One of my most cherished possessions is my Grandma Isabelle's recipe tin. I love flipping through her old fashioned "American" recipes that call for lots of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup. The tin is a food network of all of the great recipes she collected from her family and friends over the years and many predate me, like Fez's Spinach Casserole from 1971. There are recipes cut out from old newspapers and magazines, which show food trends of the time, like the article on bulgur wheat from Better Homes and Gardens in 1989. Pizza Bulgur Meatloaf anyone?  

     Recipes I have to try are Cream Cheese Cupcakes, Lentil Frankfurter Soup and Mrs. Keyser's Carrot Pudding, all written in Grandma's perfect handwriting. She was so organized and really had it all together, a trait I wish I inherited. I try to keep my recipe tin up to date, too, in case my Delicious account is lost or my blog disappears into the internet abyss. Going through all those recipes makes me very hungry, so I needed to prepare something to keep me from eating the index cards. (I was a glue eater as a child.) 

      I made this easy Spinach Goat Cheese Frittata, with farmer's market eggs, dairy, spinach and this awesome Queso Blanco garlic and parsley goat cheese from Patches of Star Dairy. It really might be one of my best yet.  

Local Spinach Goat Cheese Frittata

Bag of Spinach, chopped 

1/2 onion, sliced thinly

6-8 eggs

1/4-1/2 C. crumbled goat cheese

1/2 C. milk or cream (soy is okay, too!)

Salt and pepper

In a pan, sautee the onion until translucent in olive oil. Add the chopped spinach, drizzle more olive oil on top and season with salt and pepper. When the greens have wilted, set aside to cool. (Sometimes, I put them in the fridge of freezer.)

Preheat oven to 350. 

In a bowl, whisk together the eggs and milk and salt and pepper. Stir in the cooled spinach and the goat cheese. (You might not need all the spinach; you want a dense amount of spinach with egg running through it. Either way, it will be good, it will just either be more eggy or more spinachy. After a few frittata's you get a feel for the egg/greens ratio.)

Pour the mixture into a heavy duty oven safe greased 8-10 in. skillet. (I coat it with non-stick spray.) You can either start cooking it on the stove top to get nice color on the bottom, then put it into the oven for about 25 minutes until its it firm in the middle, or bypass the stovetop step and stick it in the oven. 

Eat with Italian bread. 

PASTA FRITTATA WITH LEMON

This Pasta Frittata can also be called considered a pasta omelet. It is a great nourishing way to use leftover pasta. My father doesn't eat chicken or eggs because he thinks that chickens are modern day dinosaurs and mom isn't a big egg eater either, so this wasn't a dish I ate at home as a kid. The vivid memory of eating Pasta Frittata was formed at a great family friend Cathy Ruocco's apartment on Sullivan Street when I was very young, and I can't somehow get it to come out as delicious as I remember it, but its still really good. Usually, I make it plain, but today I added lemon zest, chopped garlic and parsley for some extra flavor and I topped it with the leftover frittatini from the other night. 

PASTA FRITTATA

1 C. leftover cooked pasta

2 eggs

1/4 C. grated cheese

1/4 C. milk (i use soy)

salt

pepper

lemon zest

1 chopped garlic clove

parsley

olive oil

basil for garnish

In a bowl beat the eggs with milk, grated cheese, salt pepper, lemon zest, chopped garlic and parsley. Add the cooked pasta and mix it until the eggs coat the pasta. Add the mixture to a hot skillet coated with olive oil. When browned on the bottom flip it. (Flipping is not my expertise and the whole thing usually falls apart on me, but today I flipped it onto another hot skillet, which worked well but made for more dishes.) Cook until brown on bottom. Serve topped with fresh basil and extra grated cheese or some leftover sauce.