BAKED EGGS FOR BRUNCH (CHEESY ASPARAGUS QUICHE)

Today's brunch is easy, low carbs and low fat, I would not call it's a healthy meal, because it has eggs in it, as for some people, eating eggs esp egg yolks is unhealthy because of their health problems or their personal references.. I like eating eggs but I, too, have to cut off a bit because of my cholesterol number is in the red zone.

Since last week, I and some of the ladies I know from a cooking forum have agreed to have a challenge, it calls "LOW OR LESS CARB CHALLENGE" we try to support each other to consume less carb, we give ideas what we have for our meals, we tell interesting stories how hard we have to restraint ourselves not to eat carbs.. (the hardest part for me is, RICE, as I grew up in a country where its people eat rice 3 times a day)... we promise we won't cheat LOL... and at the end of the day we send email back and forth telling how our days are.. it's hard though, but it's fun and so far I managed to cut down my daily carbs intake and I managed to restraint myself from snacking at night too... I'm proud to say that when I get on my scale every morning, my number is going down and down, not much, but it's down and it motivates me to try harder..

Back to my brunch today... CHEESY ASPARAGUS TOMATO QUICHE

Ingredients:
- 4 eggs
- 1/2 lbs of asparagus, chop in 1/2 inc size
- 1 roma tomato, roughly chopped
- 4 tbsp of 2% milk
- mozzarella cheese
- garlic powder, salt and peppers

Method:
- Beat the eggs in a big bowl
- add milk, mix well
- add the chopped veggies
- garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste
- pour in a well greased small bowl or muffin tin
- add mozzarella cheese
- bake in preheated oven, 350'F for 25 minutes
- set broil and broil for a 3 minutes
- let it cool a bit and transfer it to a serving plate

Serve it with or without toast.. I ate 1/2 bowl and without toast.. it satisfied my stomach until dinner time at 4 pm

SALMON QUICHE

Salmon.. our most favorite fish ( well.. I have many favorite fishes when I still lived in Indonesia, we have so many kind of local fresh fishes, fresh water and salt water fishes, mostly very affordable ),  here.. the choice of good fish is very limited for our budget, some of them are so expensive and hard to find in our small town.. salmon is expensive too, but we have it here everyday in our local supermarket and sometimes it was on sale, so I liked to buy bunch of them and freeze them in my freezer.. I like salmon in anyway it cooked.. the other day I had an idea to cook it as quiche and it turned out very good.. I did not write it down soon, now I quite of forget how to make it, fortunately I took pictures of all the ingredients, so now I'm trying to put everything together in this post...

For the ingredients:
- 10 oz of salmon, sprinkle with lemon juice, salt and pepper
- 1 red bell pepper, diced in small size
- 1/2 medium onion, diced
- 2 cloves of garlic, finely minced
- 2 jalapeno pepper, finely chopped
- I would add spinach and chopped mushroom next time ( a reminder for me)
- 4 eggs
- 1/2 cup of milk
- 1 tbsp of flour
- salt and black pepper
- 2 flour tortilla
- 9 inch glass pie pan
- 1 cup of cheese ( I used Italian blend cheese)
- bunch of cilantro, chopped

Method:
- bake salmon in the oven, then flake it with fork, in chuck pieces
- heat a bit of oil in a pan, add onion, cook until it softened, add in garlic, bell pepper, jalapeno, and the rest of veggies, salt and pepper, cook until they are all softened, let it cool
- in a big bowl, beat eggs, add milk, salt and pepper, beat well, then add in flour, mix until the mixture is smooth
- pour salmon into the egg mix, add cheese and cilantro, stir and mix well
- lightly grease the pie pan
- place 2 layers or flour tortilla in it,
- pour in the salmon and egg mixture
- sprinkle extra cheese on it
- bake in a preheated oven, 350'F for about 30 minutes or until the eggs are set
- let it cool, cut and serve

STRAWBERRY CHEESE CAKE

I WROTE THIS ENTRY BEFORE EASTER DAY AND SAVED IS AS A DRAFT, TODAY I UPDATED IT WITH SOME PICTURES.. THE PIE TURNED OUT SO GOOD, LIGHT AND TANGY WITH A BIT OF SWEETNESS 

We are going to spend this Easter weekend at my in laws' place.. like usual we'll have Easter Eve dinner and Easter day dinner.. usually my MIL cooked ham and we enjoyed it together.. I told them I'm going to bring a pie or cake.. though I still had no idea what kind of pie or cake I'd bring..

On our morning walk I talked about it with Vickie.. she suggested apple pies and strawberry cheesecake.. our mouths were watering when we talked about it.. haha... and on the ads for our local market, strawberry was on sale, 99 cents/lbs.. so I decided to make strawberry cheesecake, I browsed around the net, mostly recipes on the internet were cheesecake topped with strawberry, I wanted to make something different, and I found this one, I decided to try it.. so we went to the store to buy strawberry, but it ran out so fast.. the employee said nada.. no more till tomorrow, then we went to another store, and I saw canned strawberry for $1, I grabbed it and it was a good choice though, much easier..

This recipe has been modified by me.. I don't want a big cake because we don't want too much leftover, we try to eat less fat and sweet :)

- 1 small pie crust (Graham Crackers)
- 1 package of cream cheese (8oz)
- 2 eggs
- 3/4 cup of sugar
- 12 oz of strawberry puree ( I use canned strawberry, drain out the juice)
- 1 tbsp of flour
- 1 tbsp of lemon juice
- vanilla ( I used fresh vanilla beans)

- beat cream cheese and sugar until well blended, add flour, continue beating
- add in 1 egg, beat well, add another one, beat well until fluffy
- add strawberry puree, lemon juice and vanilla
- beat until all well blended
- pour the mixture into the crust
- bake in a water bath for 35 to 30 minutes on a preheated oven 350'f ( as you can see, mine is a bit over baked)