A basic frittata recipe is a meal you can fall back on again and again. A frittata works for breakfast, lunch, or dinner and is a great way to use up leftover ingredients you have on hand.
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Add this basic frittata recipe to your meal planning repertoire
Fast and flavorful dinners that multi-task at any meal are key to surviving busy schedules and using up leftover cooked or raw ingredients. But somehow, I frequently forget about frittatas - the kissing cousin to a quiche.
What is a frittata?
Frittatas are the Italian version of an omelet. You prepare a mixture of eggs with vegetables, cream, and cheese, pour it in an ovenproof skillet and bake it. Couldn’t be any easier. The end result is similar to the egg part of a quiche, but less creamy and a bit more eggy. What you add for flavor is flexible – it’s a great dish to make when you need to clean out your veggie or cheese drawer.
Love egg dishes and cleaning out your fridge? You might also like my fluffy pancetta omelet.
How to serve a baked egg dish
I started cooking frittatas when I purchased the ‘wichcraft cookbook by Tom Colicchio who owns a restaurant chain of the same name that sells fantastic sandwiches. One recipe that caught my eye was an onion frittata with roasted tomato and cheddar. They list it under breakfast sandwiches but I’ve made it for lunch and dinner as well.
- Or serve this for breakfast or lunch with a fruit salad and potatoes or toast.
- For dinner, add a green salad and roasted potatoes.
- Serve this on a brunch or lunch buffet for a shower or Easter gathering or any breakfast event. You can cut the round frittata in pie-shaped slices. You can also bake them in individual cupcake tins. Your bake time will be less - so start checking for doneness at about 15 minutes.
- This is also a Passover friendly dish (without the pancetta) - a great option if you aren't sick of eggs but are watching your carbs!
Be creative with this dish – it is hard to go wrong!
Ingredient options for this basic frittata recipe
There are many ways you can modify this recipe to use up what you have on hand or adjust the flavors to your taste buds.
- Use regular onion in place of the green onion and shallot.
- Have an herb garden? Use fresh chives for color and flavor instead of OR in addition to the green onion and/or shallots.
- Add fresh spinach to the egg mixture or sauté for a couple of minutes to wilt with the onion mixture.
- Instead of fresh tomatoes, use sun-dried tomatoes.
- Need to use up some cherry tomatoes? Roast them and add to the frittata or eat them on the side.
- Have a jar of roasted roasted red peppers or some fresh peppers to use up - they would be a great addition.
- Have leftover roasted vegetables - chop and add them in.
- Vegetarian? Leave out the pancetta. Be sure to sub in some olive oil where I suggested using a bit of the rendered pancetta fat.
- Use bacon instead of pancetta. Or sausage of any kind. Even leftover beef or pork or chicken from a previous dinner.
- Half and half or even milk can sub in for the heavy cream.
- Cheeses - almost anything you love or hand on hand will work.
And that's why I call this a basic recipe for a flavorful and flexible frittata!
How to make a frittata
Be sure you have an ovenproof skillet.
In the oven proof skillet, sauté the base flavors such as the pancetta or bacon and then the onions, herbs, and tomatoes.
While those items are sautéing, prepare the egg mixture in a medium bowl.
Once the sautéed items have cooled just a bit, add them to the egg mixture and then put it all back in the skillet.
And then put the skillet in the oven to bake.
Supplies for Making a Frittata
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Basic Frittata Recipe with Flexible Flavor Options
Beth LeeIngredients
- ¾ cup diced pancetta
- 1 medium shallot
- 3 green onions
- ½ tablespoon fresh thyme
- 1 tablespoon fresh oregano
- ½ cup sliced cherry tomatoes regular tomatoes, or roasted tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon Herbes de Provence optional
- 8 large eggs
- ½ cup heavy cream
- 1 tablespoon grated parmesan cheese
- ¼ cup shredded cheddar
- 1 teaspoon pepper
- ½ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 300 degrees regular or convection
- Saute the pancetta in the 10 inch ovenproof skillet on medium heat. When the fat is rendered and they are crispy and brown, remove from pan, put on a paper towel to drain, and wipe most of the pancetta fat out of the pan.
- While the pancetta is browning, chop the shallot, green onion, thyme, oregano, and tomato.
- Once the pancetta is removed from the skillet, add the diced green onion and shallot to the pan and sauté for a minute or two, still on medium heat.
- Add the diced tomatoes, chopped thyme, oregano, and Herbes de Provence (if using) and sauté until the tomatoes soften - another 2 minutes or so. Take off the heat.
- In a medium bowl, mix the eggs, cream, parmesan and cheddar cheese, and salt and pepper. Add the diced pancetta and onion mixture from the pan. Mix together and add back to the skillet.
- If you are not using a non-stick skillet, a little butter or olive oil in the bottom of the skillet before the eggs are added back in might be wise.
- Bake at 300 degrees regular for about 30 minutes or 300 degrees convection for 20 minutes.
- Once it is cooled slightly, remove from the pan onto a surface that you can cut on and slice as desired into pie shapes or square if making a sandwich.
Notes
- There are many ways to speed up or modify this recipe. Regular onion can be used in place of the green onion and shallot. Fresh chives can be added for color and flavor instead of or in addition to the green onion and or shallots.
- Spinach can be added fresh to the egg mixture or sauteed for a couple of minutes to wilt with the onion mixture.
- Instead of fresh tomatoes, sundried tomatoes right out of a jar would work great as would already made roasted tomatoes or roasted red peppers (or both).
- Have leftover roasted vegetables - chop and add them in.
- Vegetarian? Leave out the pancetta. Be sure to sub in some olive oil where I suggested using a bit of the rendered pancetta fat. Bacon would also work well instead of pancetta.
- I also think that half and half or even milk can sub in for the heavy cream and certainly you can play around with the cheeses that you use. That's why I called it a flavorful and flexible frittata!!!
yumivore
fast and it does sound flavorful! an eggsellent recipe added to a new post: fresh from the coop and garden http://yumivore.com/2012/09/16/garden-fresh/
Beth
Neat post Orly with at least a dozen eggsellent suggestions of how to raise chickens and cook eggs! Great idea Orly and thanks for including my frittata post.
Modern Gypsy
This looks yummy - and I found it just when I was craving something eggy but didn't want to have an omlette.
Dropping by from SITS 🙂
Beth
Satisfy your craving and leave you with leftovers for the next craving!
Hannah
Frittatas are the best! I love your frittata sandwich, too. My head is whirling as I think about school next week - I already spent this morning doing paperwork. I'm savoring these last moments of summer! Hope you are, too.
Beth
Still trying to savor the leftover sun of summer but the winds are a changing - fall is really coming our way.
Andrea
Hello from St. Louie! This sounds delicious! It looks hardy enough to serve at dinnertime. Thanks!
hilljean
I saw your title over on SITS and I clicked on it BECAUSE of the awesome alliteration 🙂 Frittatas are a food that I forget about and I have no idea why! They are so good though. I'm glad you reminded me. I once made one of the Pioneer Woman's frittatas and she used Naked Pita Chips as the base--it was so good! I'm pinning your recipe for future use as well 🙂
Beth
Hi and welcome! I see we both have 'f' alliterations in common - saw this on your "about page": fascinating, frightening, and fun. LOL. Thanks for stopping by. I bet frittatas would be easy for you to pull together in your small kitchen and something your kids would eat too! Thanks for pinning and stopping by. Pioneer Woman's recipe sounds fun. I'll have to go check it out.
yummychunklet
It's always handy to have these kinds of recipes on hand. Great post!
Beth
I want one of your popovers from TwD to go with it!
Carol Sacks
I fancy frittatas! Trying the alliterative approach and failing:) That pancetta veggie number has my name on it. Nice post, Beth.
Beth
Thanks Carol. How fortuitous for me that you follow my blog and fancy me as a friend!
sandy corman
sounds great and will try. Can i cut recipe in half for just the two of us? will pan say oven proof?
Im not sure I have one. What is name of pan you use?
Beth
Absolutely can cut it in half but be sure to use a smaller pan. Look at the bottom of the pan - it might say if it's ovenproof. Also - check the handle - you can usually tell if the handle is ovenproof. If not, send me a photo of it and I'll try to tell.
Diane
I tasted this right out of Beth's pan in her kitchen and it is OMG Yummy! Great job, Beth! Thanks.
Beth
Thanks Diane! It was awesome to have a taste-tester (and proofreader today). Are you available for hire? 🙂