Breakfast Egg Cups

Sometimes I get a notion on weekend mornings to make something unusual for breakfast. I love breakfast food in a big way, as I've written about here before. The food blogs that I follow always give me the inspiration to try something new for breakfast. It was on this blog that I found the recipe for Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Toast Cups.














They start simply, just frying bacon in pan - as many strips as you want cups.













I got to cut the bread with this nifty cookie/biscuit cutter from a stackable set that John's mom gave me last Christmas.














I forgot to add the cheese before I poured in the eggs, so we added it on top. I think it'd be just as easy to add a slice (instead of shredded) of any type of cheese to the bread before pouring in the egg. It'd be an easy way to fancy these up, if you care about that kind of thing.


Sometimes I pretend to, but when it takes more than 5 minutes for me to cook my breakfast, fancy usually goes out the window.














They smell delicious when they come out of the oven.













They're a little less colorful in this picture, but look how nicely they stay together! Bacon makes a much nicer wrapper than I expected. As long as you like your eggs done and not runny, they come out intact really well. I think these would make a great thing to bring to a brunch potluck.* You can make a dozen just as easily as 4 and they're pretty easy to put together.

Ingredients:
6 slices of bacon**
6 slices of bread
Shredded cheese
6 eggs
Salt and pepper

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400° F. Grease 6 wells of a muffin pan with butter. In a frying pan, cook bacon about 3-5 minutes, until partially cooked but not completely crispy. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate. Cut out rounds of bread (I used a 3.5-inch round cookie cutter, but a drinking glass would be fine.) Press the bread rounds into the greased muffin wells. Curl a piece of bacon around the periphery of each piece of bread, positioning it between the bread and the muffin tin to help keep it in position. Sprinkle a small amount of shredded cheese in the center of each piece of bread. One at a time, crack an egg, removing about half of the white, and dropping the remaining white and yolk over each piece of bread, being careful not to break the yolks. Once all the bread pieces have been topped with eggs, bake until eggs are cooked through to your liking (about 6-10 minutes)*** and bacon is crispy. Run a knife around the edge of each muffin well and pop the egg cups out. Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve immediately.

*the best kind of potluck.

**I only used four because three eggs are too much for me. Also, we used turkey bacon because it's way less fattening.

***Mine took a little longer to be completely cooked through, maybe 13 minutes total.