My sister-in-law baked this sumptuous casserole for Christmas breakfast this past year and it was so wonderful I had to have the recipe. This breakfast casserole is full of sausage, hash browns, and cheese, and it has a light egg-type souffle mixture poured over the top which holds it all together. It’s made differently than all the breakfast stratas and breakfast casseroles I’ve made before that have bread on the bottom. In fact, we liked this much better.
I make no pretense that this casserole is healthy or low calorie but it certainly is delicious. For those of you who like breakfast for dinner this is great option for that too. This casserole is so tasty and so easy to throw together. I fried the sausage, green pepper and onion the night before. Then I added the cheese and potatoes and after stirring all the ingredients together. Then, I put the dish in the refrigerator overnight. The next morning I mixed the Bisquick, egg, and milk mixture and poured it over top of the rest of the ingredients and baked it. Cheese is added the last few minutes. It’s really easy with only a few steps to make it and yet the payoff in taste is B-I-G!
I really thought the taste of this casserole was superior to many of my other breakfast casseroles I have recipes for (probably close to 10) so we will be making this one regularly in the future. I’m not sure where my sister-in-law, DeEtte, found this recipe but I’ll give her the credit for it. I have made a few minor changes to the recipe as she gave it to me. The instructions below are the way I made it.
If you’re looking for a great breakfast casserole for brunch, special occasions like baby showers, or holiday breakfasts this is a casserole you should consider. It’s really fantastic, tastes great, and is quite simple to put together. This is great served with fruit, a sweet bread like my Cranberry Fruit Nut Bread, Pecan Cranberry Muffins, Cream Cheese Danish Pastry, Breakfast Cobbler, Blueberry Coffeecake, or Heather’s Chocolate Chip Banana-Nut Bread, and Greek yogurt or baked oatmeal.
Here’s a side view of this tasty breakfast casserole. You can see all the sausage, shredded hash brown potatoes and cheese in this dish.
Here’s another view so you can see the texture.
I added extra cheese, but I think you could also sprinkle the casserole with parsley and some other herbs to add extra flavor.
Here’s what I did.
Cook two pounds of bulk pork sausage in a very large skillet or Dutch oven.
Cook diced green pepper (or any other color bell pepper) along with the sausage while cooking.
Add diced onion and cook along with sausage. I ran out of regular onions and so I used up a red onion.
Meanwhile, spray a 9×13″ casserole dish with baking spray and set aside.
Cook and stir sausage and vegetables until the sausage is no longer pink.
Here the sausage is cooked through.
Drain any grease. I keep an old spaghetti sauce jar under my sink and pour off all grease into that. Once it’s full I discard the jar in the trash. Don’t pour grease down your disposal or your drains as it clogs septic and sewer lines.
Add frozen shredded hash brown potatoes to sausage mixture.
Add shredded sharp cheddar cheese.
Stir all the ingredients together and place into greased 9×13″ pan.
Here I’ve placed the contents into the greased baking dish. At this point I wrapped up the casserole and refrigerated it overnight. I was on a time crunch this morning and knew I wouldn’t have time to start from the beginning making this casserole and be done on time.
Place bisquick in a mixing bowl.
Add pepper. If you want more spices or herbs this is the time to add them. Dried parsley is a great herb to add.
Add eggs.
Add milk.
Whisk ingredients together and pour over breakfast casserole.
Here I’m pouring the ingredients over the breakfast casserole.
This is what the casserole looks like before I put it into the oven.
You can see the milk mixture fell to the bottom of the pan.
The recipe said to cook the casserole for 30-35 minutes at 400. Next time I will cook it at 350 even if it takes a little longer so it doesn’t get quite so brown on the top.
Remove casserole from oven and add remaining cheese. Bake another 5-10 minutes until cheese is completely melted.
Here’s what the casserole looks like after the cheese has melted.
I took this casserole to a breakfast meeting. Here we’ve dug into the casserole quite extensively.
This close up shows all the cheesy goodness in this dish.
Here’s another close up so you can see the texture of this delicious casserole.
This picture shows how the texture of the dish set up after baking. It’s a great breakfast casserole. The casserole was pretty well cleaned out by the time I was ready to take it home.
This great breakfast dish has lots of sausage, hash brown potatoes and cheese. Everybody loved it. Yum, yum.
Here’s the recipe.
BREAKFAST BAKE
(Recipe adapted from my sister-in-law, DeEtte Amspaugh, Safety Harbor, FL)
2 16-oz. pkgs. bulk pork sausage
1 medium bell pepper, chopped (1 cup) – any color pepper will do
1 medium onion, chopped (1/2 cup) – I used red onoin
3 cups frozen hash browns
3 cups shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
1 cup original Bisquick baking mix
¼ tsp. pepper
4 eggs
2 cups milk
1-2 tbsp. dried parsley, if desired
Heat oven to 350°. Spray 9×13” glass baking dish with cooking spray. Cook sausage, bell pepper, and onion in large skillet or Dutch oven over medium heat until sausage is cooked through. Drain off grease. Stir together sausage mixture, hash brown potatoes and 1 ½ cups shredded cheddar cheese. Pour into greased baking dish. In a mixing bowl stir Bisquick mix, pepper, milk, eggs, and parsley or any other spices/herbs you like. Pour over top of casserole. Bake about 45 minutes or until knife inserted in center comes out clean. Sprinkle 1 ½ cups cheese over top of casserole and heat through an additional 5-10 minutes. Serves 12.
Doesn’t this breakfast bake look delectable?
Here’s a great view of the texture. The extra cheese makes the comforting Breakfast Bake so much more satisfying.
I’ve saved a plate for you! Come join me for breakfast.
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I love cheese. I like the extra cheese idea. Yum!
This looks great.
Thanks. It really tasted wonderful. I was so glad my sister-in-law shared it with us on Christmas Day.
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Looks so good!! I am thinking besides breakfast/brunch.., dinner with pancakes
Yes! I love breakfast for dinner.
This is what I should have made for Christmas breakfast. Yum. Bookmarked for next year!
Yeah, you can make it before then, too! It’s really so tasty. We really enjoyed this.
My, that is a thing of beauty. I’m supposed to be thinking about dinner not breakfast, Teresa, but who says you can’t have breakfast for dinner, hmm?
We love breakfast for dinner! In fact, we have had a lot of Sunday school parties where we did just that with our young couples’ Sunday school class. They loved breakfast for dinner and we do too.
Oh, that looks so good.
It really is so fantastic.