Ham, Potato & Egg Casserole

By Paul Briand

Every Easter it’s the same thing: What do we do with the leftover ham?

My mother normally gets the bone for a wonderful pea and ham soup that she makes. One of these days, I’ll get the recipe posted.

Last year, I made a Ham Casserole, using a can cream of celery soup as the base.

This year, a stumbled on a recipe TheKitchn.com by way of the Foodily app on my iPhone.

It caught my eye originally because of the bacon. But I decided to re-do the original recipe, substituting bacon with ham, upping the number of eggs and milk, using a little more cheese as a  topping and adding some panko bread crumbs to give it a bit of a crunchy crust.

Ingredients
2 cups cooked ham, diced
1 large yellow onion, peeled and diced
1 yellow bell pepper, cleaned out and diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
10 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon fresh-cracked black pepper
3 cups shredded cheddar cheese, divided
3 cups frozen diced potatoes, unthawed
½ cup panko bread crumbs

Directions
1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees, and lightly grease a large baking dish with baking spray or olive oil;
2. In a teaspoon of olive oil over medium high heat, cook the onion, yellow bell pepper, garlic, sun-dried tomatoes until all the vegetables are soft. Turn off the heat and let cool slightly;
3. In a large bowl, beat the eggs thoroughly and whisk in the milk and black pepper;
4. Stir in 2 cups of cheese, frozen potatoes, ham and vegetables from the skillet;
5. Pour the whole mixture into the baking dish and bake for 20 minutes;
6. Remove from oven and top with remaining cheese and bread crumbs;
7. Return to oven and bake another 20 minutes or until the eggs are firm;
8. Serve immediately.

This was originally cast as a breakfast casserole, but works perfectly fine as a brunch or dinner dish.

Click here for recipe card.