Cheesy Tomato Spinach Breakfast Strata Recipe

We all know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and it may be at its most important when you're hosting guests for brunch. Preparing warm food early in the morning is a daunting task for any host; the easiest way to make it seem effortless is to prepare it ahead of time. With strata, a casserole made out of bread, eggs, milk, and cheese, breakfast for a crowd is a breeze — and you don't even have to get up extra early to make it.

Strata isn't too different from eggy, fluffy frittata – the distinction is that strata includes bread cubes, which are baked into a simultaneously soft and crunchy texture (kind of like Thanksgiving stuffing). It's essentially a bread pudding, but with savory ingredients instead of sweet — making it an excellent alternative to French toast bakes and Dutch baby pancakes. This cheesy tomato and spinach breakfast strata recipe, written with developer Michelle McGlinn, is a perfectly savory, filling, and tangy breakfast that has everything you need in one dish, making breakfast easy even if you're serving the early birds.

The first ingredient you will need is bread. While we love the tangy, earthy flavors of sourdough bread, you can use any crusty bread here so long as there's enough to fill the casserole dish. As one of the best ways to use stale bread, we recommend using bread that is a few days old — this will help infuse the bread with flavor rather than go soggy. After you find bread, you'll also need bacon, onion, garlic, spinach, fontina cheese, feta, eggs, milk, salt, pepper, and plenty of tomato. You can use any-sized tomato, such as grape, cherry, or even Roma, but we like cocktail tomatoes the best here for their in-between size.

Spread the sourdough pieces in a 9 x 13-inch casserole dish.

Add the bacon to a skillet over medium heat.

Cook, stirring often, until well browned and crispy, about 5 minutes.

Remove the bacon from the skillet and drain on paper towels.

Leaving a thin layer of grease in the skillet, add the onion and cook to soften, about 3 minutes.

Add the garlic and spinach and cook until the spinach is wilted, about 30 more seconds.

Remove the skillet from the heat and spread the vegetables into the casserole dish. Then mix in the reserved bacon.

Sprinkle the fontina and feta over the mixture.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, salt, and pepper.

Pour the egg mixture into the casserole dish and cover it with foil. Refrigerate for 1 hour or up to overnight.

When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 375 F.

Add the sliced tomatoes to the mixture, spreading them over the top. Reserve the foil.

Bake uncovered for 30 minutes, then return the foil to the top and bake covered for 30 more minutes, or until browned.

Let cool slightly before serving.

• Espresso Crumb Coffee Cake Recipe
• Homemade Horchata Iced Coffee Recipe
• Everything Bagel Cream Cheese Rolls Recipe
• Fruity Orange Cream Smoothie Recipe
• Tried and True Bloody Mary Recipe

If it feels funny to prep everything but the tomatoes the night before, we can explain. Fresh tomatoes are high in water content and, when sliced and left to rest, will release a good amount of water, especially if exposed to salt. Because the strata is already soaking in a mixture of eggs and milk, the added juices from the tomatoes can cause the bread to become soggier than intended and the whole dish to become watery. To prevent this, we simply add the tomatoes right before baking.

Adding the tomatoes right away won't ruin the dish, though, and if you are planning to serve the strata the same day, you can even mix the tomatoes into the strata rather than placing them on top. If you'd like to add the tomatoes the night before, we recommend slicing them and letting them drain on a paper towel or in a colander for a few minutes before adding them to the strata. You can also swap the fresh tomato for sun-dried, which will add a tangy, tart flavor to the casserole that works well with the feta.

The short answer is yes, you can bake the strata immediately after adding the egg mixture, but the bread will not be nearly as soft or flavorful. Strata, when baked, should take on a custardy, fluffy texture, which is caused by soaking the stale bread in milk and eggs. The longer the bread is soaked, the more egg and milk it absorbs, which is why it makes an excellent dish to prep the night before. We recommend soaking for about 8 hours — anything longer, and the bread will be soggy.

If you're in a pinch and need to serve the strata as soon as possible, there's a way you can shortcut the soak. Add the bread to the casserole dish and then immediately add the milk and egg mixture. Let the bread soak while you cook the bacon, onion, garlic, and spinach, then stir the ingredients into the bread mixture carefully. Add the cheese and tomatoes, then let them soak a little while longer while the oven preheats. This way, the bread will have had an extra 15 to 20 minutes of soaking in the egg, making for a more fluffy strata in a time crunch.

• Caprese Frittata With Arugula Recipe
• Brunch-Perfect Sausage Strata Recipe
• Slow-Cooker Breakfast Casserole Recipe
• Plant-Based "Egg"y Breakfast Casserole Recipe
• Overnight Eggs Benedict Casserole Recipe
• Apple Fritter Breakfast Casserole Recipe