Monte Cristo Recipe

Brunch is one of my favorite meals of the day.  Sausage and Cheese Casserole, cinnamon and nutmeg pancakes, or a yummy Monte Cristo sandwich.  Today I'm going to share our recipe for the delicious Monte Cristo!

It's really the epitome of "brunch" - it's a ham and cheese sandwich, dipped in egg and cooked like french toast.  Perfect.  We especially love to make these when using up leftover ham. Use honey mustard to kick the dish up a notch!

Ingredients

Oatmeal bread
Ham
Swiss cheese
Honey mustard
Eggs
Milk
Maple syrup
Powdered sugar (optional)
Jam (optional)


Directions

Make your sandwich: ham, Swiss cheese and honey mustard.  (You could even add a little mayo if you wanted!)

Whisk together eggs and milk (1 egg per sandwich + generous splash of milk).

Spray frying pan with Pam cooking spray and turn burner on low/medium.

Dip each side of sandwich in egg/milk mixture and place in frying pan.

Cook for 4-6 minutes (or until side is browned) on each side.

Serve immediately with maple syrup, powdered sugar and fruit or jam.

Enjoy!

Tell Us Tuesday #3

Welcome to the Tell Us Tuesday party everyone!  We’re excited to see what you’ve been up to this week!  Stop by every Tuesday to link up your latest blog posts and show off what you’ve been up to,  then check out the other links and find new bloggers to follow, inspiration for new projects, parenting tricks, or a new yummy dinner idea.  

Since this party is hosted by several bloggers, your links will be on multiple sites!

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Your Co-Hosts

One FineWire – Facebook Page – Twitter – Pinterest - Bloglovin'

Much Ado About Somethin – Facebook Page – Twitter – Pinterest - Bloglovin'

This week's guest host is Bailey, who can be found at aka Bailey.  She is a creative 28-year-old who loves laughing, creating collages, writing, taking photographs, thrifty shopping and concocting easy DIYs.  Bailey moved from Massachusetts to the west coast in January 2012 and then moved up to Vancouver, BC in October 2012, where she lives now with my boyfriend of 5+ years, David.  You can also find her here:

aka Bailey - Facebook Page - Twitter - Pinterest - Bloglovin'

Now for some of the features from last week!

Food Features

Uh, seriously - this coffee waffle treat looks amazing!  If you are a coffee addict like so many, why not add waffles to the mix?

If you want your entire kitchen to smell like warm delicious bread, this is the recipe for you!  The ingredients are simple and it's easy to make - you can save it to your family or give as a gift around the holidays.

DIY Features

For those that like doing things to your home on a budget - this is a fabulous post.  Check out how an easy few steps can change the look of your fireplace!

Now this is shabby to chic!  Check out Denise and how she took a simple dresser from a rummage sale from old-fashioned and boring to AMAZING!

Mommies Tellin' It Like It Is

When you have a baby, it's so nice to see what other moms are doing throughout their days. Check out Rochelle's schedule with her darling daughters, Eleanor and Hazel.

Emily @ And Lucy Makes Three shares her first experience on a cruise with her family - including a toddler.  If you've ever been wondering what to do on a boat, read this post!  Her family is just darling!

If you were featured, grab a button!

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Now to PARTY!  Just a few basic rules we’d love for you to follow:

- Tell us about your recipes, parenting tips, DIY projects, or your family vacation – we want to see it all!

- Follow each of us so you’ll ever miss a party.  Follow on GFC, Bloglovin’, or your favorite reader – we’d love to hear from you!

- Add a party text link or button to your blog.  This helps us in exchange for letting ‘ya link up!  The more people that know about the party, the better.

- Click around – find a few links that interest you below and check them out!  Better yet, leave them a comment and tell them where you came from!

- Spread the word – Share the party on Facebook and Twitter so more can join in the fun.  The more people that find out about Tell Us Tuesday, the more it benefits you!  

- We’d also love for you to follow us on Facebook and Twitter.  We follow back! 

- By linking up, you’re giving permission for us to potentially feature your posts on the blog or social media.

An InLinkz Link-up

Healthy Smoothie - Oatmeal, Spinach & Berries

If you've been following along at home, you know I'm a sucker for a good smoothie.  This week I decided to add a few ingredients to one of my favorite mixtures of fruit to make it healthier, and loved what I ended up with.  Adding oats and spinach to the already delicious list of ingredients makes this a fantastic breakfast! I was SO full after drinking mine!

All you need is:

1 medium banana
5-6 strawberries
1 cup blueberries
1/4 cup yogurt (I used strawberry Chobani)
1/4 cup oats (I used Old Fashioned Quaker Oats)
1-1.5 cups baby spinach
1/2 cup water (or more)

Then just fill your blender and blend until smooth!  I gave it a little longer than usual to make sure the oats were pulverized.  :)

Even husband liked it!

Have fun switching out the fruit you use - I don't think you'll come up with a bad combination.

Interested in other cool treats?  Check out a few of my frozen yogurt recipes - Blackberry Honey Frozen Yogurt and Strawberry Banana Fro Yo!

Enjoy!

Sausage and Cheese Breakfast Casserole

Most days I end up eating Cheerios from a plastic bag at work for breakfast.  Eating the same thing every day can get pretty boring and really makes me appreciate hot breakfasts even more.  One of my favorite things to make is a Sausage and Cheese Breakfast Casserole.  In addition to being really easy to whip up, you can make it the night before and refrigerate, so there's no need to get up extra early to prep!

When I heard we were having a "Breakfast with Oscar" party this past Sunday, I knew exactly what I was going to bring.  This recipe came from my fabulous mother-in-law's arsenal of go-to breakfasts, but I'm not sure of its origins before that.  Hope you enjoy!

Ingredients

6 slices of bread
1 pound sausage (I used Jimmy Dean)
6 eggs
1 can Carnation Evaporated Milk
Salt & Pepper
Shredded cheddar cheese (about 2.5 cups)
Large Pyrex dish

Directions

Cut slices of bread into cubes and cover the bottom of your Pyrex dish.

Brown and drain sausage, then sprinkle over the bread.

Mix eggs, evaporated milk, salt and pepper in a medium bowl.  Then pour evenly over bread and sausage.

Then give the entire dish a generous sprinkle of cheese - I used about 2.5 cups.

Cover and refrigerate for at least one hour (or overnight).  Bake at 375 F for 25-30 minutes, then let sit for 5 minutes before serving.

You can also make this weeks in advance and freeze (before cooking) for later!  You're gonna love it!

Our Crazy Oscar Party

I love the Oscars.  Most years we've only seen a few of the films, but this year we'd seen about half of the "big ones" -  Argo, Lincoln, Les Miserables, and Silver Linings Playbook.  All of them were fantastic, so we decided we'd just be happy for whoever won.  The one thing I was disappointed in was that Frankenweenie didn't win.

This year we went to our friend's Ann and Terence's house for an Oscar party.  Ann loves to throw "theme parties", and our friend Jerin had been lobbying for a pajama party...so we figured why not dress down for one of the most dressed up nights of TV?  Turns out Ann had asked both her husband and I on different occasions what we should eat...and both of us responded with a resounding BREAKFAST...so "Breakfast with Oscar" was born.

Here are a few shots from the evening.

The food was delicious!  We had waffles with Nutella, bacon, a beautiful fruit salad, amazing gluten free scones, and a breakfast casserole that's out of this world (recipe coming later this week).

The scones were the BEST GF bread I'd ever had.  Ann made them with Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix.  At $8/bag it's a little expensive, but was SO delicious!

And of course the pups played.  Toby came into the party wearing a Snuggie our friend Susan gave him a few years ago, but quickly wiggled out of it.  He had to dress in PJ's too, right?

Toby, Amelia, and Sara (see her in the background?)

Pete laid on the floor, which of COURSE was an invitation for the dogs to attack.

Fun night!