It is a new day, a new way, time to do some cooking!
Recipe for scrambled eggs with chicken, using 1 skillet
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| The start of a new meal |
Cast Iron Cooking - One pan scrambled eggs with chicken with Belkin
It is a new day, a new way, time to do some cooking!
Cooking with cast iron has been a passion of mine for many years. Today I am starting this blog site in hopes of being able to spread the joy with others so that they might also develop a love of cast iron cooking.
I will be posting more about how to clean, maintain, season, and cook with your cast iron cookware, or maybe guide you into getting your first pan or skillet to use in your kitchen.
This post is a description that includes ingredients and a Recipe for Scrambled Eggs with chicken, cooked in a single cast iron skillet or pan.
Here I will demonstrate how I used a single cast iron skillet to make a delicious, easy, and tasty chicken, cheese, and scrambled egg meal. This post is a simple step by step how to demonstration of how to create a simple, fast meal that can be made cheaply using a cast iron skillet.
The main ingredients are eggs for this meal are as follows.
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| Kraft Mexican Style 4 Cheese |
Kraft Mexican Style 4 Cheese
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| Skinless and boneless chicken |
Skinless and boneless chicken
One bell pepper
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| Bell pepper and onion |
One yellow onion
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| Himalayan pink sea salt |
Himalayan pink sea salt
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| Course ground pepper |
Course ground pepper
Giorgio whole-sliced mushrooms
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| 4th and Heart Ghee |
4th and Heart Ghee
and Whole milk
Before I dive into the actual instructions, I would like to point out that I created this meal without any instructions. Usually, the way that I cook is to decide what I would like to eat, consider the various types of results I might like to see, and then basically toss in ingredients that I think will go together well, to produce the end result I am looking for.
The reason that I point this out for a couple of reasons. For you, as someone who might like to try cooking this meal, I want to present a guide you can follow, but it really is just to get you started. I almost expect you to add and subtract from my instructions to suit your own tastes.
You can follow this recipe exactly and you will finish with a very tasty meal, just as I originally designed.
In cooking, I personally have some specific requirements that I try to follow when cooking. What I eat, or what I consume in my body is important to me. For this reason, there are certain foods or products that I avoid if I can. This is one of the reasons that I cook with cast iron cookware instead of skillet, pots, and pans that have Teflon to have a nonstick surface.
Nothing against anyone else’s choices on cookware, but for me, I would prefer to avoid ever consuming materials like Teflon as part of my diet.
For me, another consideration in my meal planning is sugar, specifically processed sugars, including high fructose corn syrups, or byproducts of the same. Many of the ingredients that you find in your local grocery store are produced using processed sugars. This is one of my motivations for cooking meals from ingredients that I can pick myself, to avoid processed sugars.
Many of my meals and meal recipes are based loosely on a Keto type of diet as a result of trying to avoid processed sugars. When you look at the ingredient list on this recipe you will notice that there are no added processed sugars, although I will use honey as a sweetener.
So as the cook of this recipe, I encourage you to be creative in your meal. If my ingredients list a particular cheese, but you prefer a different cheese, my recipe is designed to survive that change and still create a delicious meal. This recipe includes bell peppers. I used the color pepper I had in the refrigerator for the meal, however, you are not restricted to using that specific pepper. You can choose to leave it out entirely, replace it with a different color bell pepper, or replace it with an entirely different type of pepper that you have and prefer. I encourage you to do so!
The very same goes for my onion choice. Be brave fellow cook! Use what you have, what you prefer, or leave it out entirely, dealers' choice!
I use the liquid in the recipe to keep the eggs moist in the pan as they are cooking. In this case, I use milk or whipping cream if I have it. If I don’t have either of those, I can use a small amount of water. It will not ruin the eggs, although they will be different.
Another consideration in my recipe is the number of eggs I use. I love eggs, and generally, I like to cook a meal, with a planned leftover meal included so that later I can heat up the leftovers and have another meal. As always with my recipes, you use your own judgment there, if you do not want leftovers, or if you are cooking for more people, adjust to suit. One example with the choice of the number of eggs is, how many people are you cooking for? How many eggs would each person like to eat in a single meal? Multiply the number of people by the number of eggs each and you get a good idea about how many eggs to cook.
Once you decide how many eggs you are going to scramble you will have to adjust the size of your cast iron cookware to match. In this recipe, there is chicken that the eggs are cooked with, so in a large skillet, I can easily cook 8 to 10 eggs. This recipe is designed to use a single skillet for the meal, however, you can alter that as well. If you have multiple skillets and it is easier to divide the chicken from the eggs, do it! I encourage you! Let me know if you try other options, I would love to know the results you get.
One last variation you can use in this recipe that would have a different twist on the outcome is to bake the scrambled eggs in the oven. To do that, cook your chicken as per the recipe, and scramble your eggs as per the recipe, but instead of cooking the eggs on the stovetop, simply put the eggs in the oven at 380 degrees (F), and bake them until they are done. They will have a nice browned top, and you might be able to slice out sections like a quiche. Again, if you try this, let me know how it turns out in the comments below. Be brave!
Having said all that, let's get back to our recipe with our newly altered ingredient list.
The main ingredients are eggs for this meal are as follows.
- ½ to 1 cup of Kraft Mexican Style 4 cheese, or your preferred cheese, shredded
- 1 to 2 Skinless and boneless chicken breasts or your favorite type of chicken meat
- One bell pepper - any color will do, or replace it with your favorite spicy pepper
- One yellow onion - or any other color onion, or possibly chives
- A small sprinkle of Himalayan pink sea salt - at your discretion.
- A splash of Course ground pepper - to taste
- A can of Giorgio whole-sliced mushrooms that was drained of the water in the can.
- 4th and Heart Ghee - Or substitute for your favorite cooking oil
- ½ to 1 cup of Whole milk, cream, or water - Use enough to cover half the cheese
Directions and Recipe -
1. Set oven to 380 Degrees (f), and place one large cast iron skillet or pan in the oven to heat up.
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| Set oven to 380 |
2. Cut up 1 bell pepper into small bite-size pieces (your choice of color, red, yellow, or green).
3. Cut up 1 onion into small bite-size pieces (your choice, red, yellow, or white).
4. Open and drain canned mushrooms.
5. Place the cheese and milk, whipping crème, or water into a mixing bowl. The cheese amount is to your liking. Try 1/2 cup to start. Add enough liquid to fill up about 1/2 the cheese.
6. Break open 10 eggs (the number of eggs of your choice, read the description above) for a couple of people, or 5 for one (you decide how many eggs you want to eat), into the mixing bowl, and scramble the cheese, milk, and eggs together.
7. Remove the skillet or pan from the oven (be careful, they will be hot), and add ghee to the skillet or pan.
8. Put the chicken breasts in the pan, turn on the stove to medium heat, sear the meat to seal it, and return it to the oven.
9. After about 10 minutes, check the chicken and flip it. Repeat until the chicken is cooked.
10. Once cooked, remove the pan from the oven, transfer the chicken to a cutting board, and cut the chicken into bite-size pieces. Return the chicken to the pan, and return the pan to the oven.
11. Check the chicken again in about 10 minutes to verify that the chicken is cooked.
12. Add onions, peppers, and mushrooms to the pan, and return it to the oven. Check the mix every 10 minutes, when the onions are translucent, turn the oven off, remove the pan from the oven, place it on the stove, and set the stove to a low temperature.
13. Re-scramble the egg mixture together and add it to the pan on the stovetop over low heat.
14. In about 8-10 minutes, stir the eggs, flipping them over in the pan to cook evenly. Repeat until the eggs are cooked.
15. When the eggs are cooked, turn the heat off under the eggs, prepare a serving dish or bowl, and serve.
More Options
Here is a little more about the variations that this recipe allows, and again, I would encourage you to try out the various options. Changing a few things can make a new meal from the same recipe and ingredients.
The mushrooms, onions, and peppers in the above recipe are added to the chicken when it is almost cooked in the oven. Doing this gives the mushrooms, onions, and peppers a chance to sear a little, and to get rid of some of the moisture that they each have. Although the onions likely will not brown, they may cook through until they are translucent and help to flavor the chicken meat a little.
It is possible and maybe preferable to add the onions, peppers, and mushrooms to the scrambled egg mixture with the cheese, milk, salt, and pepper. The biggest difference here is that they will not add any flavoring to the chicken when it is cooking directly, but will add a different, more fresh vegetable flavor to the eggs when they are cooking. In this method, the onions, and peppers may be a little more “crunchy” in the eggs and add more texture than if cooked with the chicken. Further, the moisture from the onions, peppers, and mushrooms cooked with the eggs, will make the eggs moister, or require a longer cooking time to finish the eggs.
I mentioned above the recipe that you can cook, or actually bake, this entire meal in the oven. This holds true for both the onion, pepper and mushroom options. If you want to bake the mixture in the oven, you can either cook the onions, peppers, and mushrooms with the chicken, add the eggs and bake, or you can bake the chicken by itself, add the onions, peppers, and mushrooms to the eggs and add it to the chicken to bake in the oven.
Very much, the beauty of this recipe is that you can cook it with common ingredients you find in most homes, and you can easily substitute ingredients to the recipe as you see fit. This meal can be done small, with fewer eggs, and less chicken, or it can be made large, with more eggs and more chicken.
In reality, multiple recipes can be created from this one basic recipe. Use different meat, and the recipe will still work. Use different vegetables, again, this will still work.
Mostly, I wanted to demonstrate how easy it is to cook with your cast iron cookware, the variety of foods you can produce, and the variety of methods you can use to cook those recipes.
Happy Cooking!
Much Love,
Belkin Vanderspuds
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