ONION AND GRUYERE MINI FRITTATA

Sometimes (rarely) I really love waking up to a rainy weekend. It poured in New York all day long on Sunday. It felt like a reason to stay in pajamas, and dash out only quickly for coffee and eggs, and do things like finish baking a birthday cake (more on that soon) and clean the apartment.

I've been trying to be more mindful of cooking with leftover odds-and-ends in the hope of wasting less food and being slightly more frugal. I also think it makes me get more adventurous in the kitchen with spices and techniques, as I have to find ways to adapt to what I have (half a red onion? ginger that is questionably old? a nub of very salty sheep's milk cheese?) -- it's like a real-life episode of Chopped. Except you can't really lose, unless your breakfast turns out to be truly wretched.

In this case, I had two pita sprinkled in za'atar spice, left over from lunch the day before, and eggs and cheese and onion. I've always thought frittatas (and egg dishes in general) sounded sort of intimidating, with all the spatula-raising and pan-tipping and careful baking. For this breakfast, I just mixed eggs with milk, cheese, salt and pepper, and sliced green onions then stirred in some quickly sautéed red onion and garlic. I poured the mixture into small ramekins and baked them for 15 minutes. They puffed up beautifully and if you take them out when the center is slightly jiggly still, they will continue to cook and be perfectly done by the time you dig in. With a warm toasted pita and a milky latte, they made a rainy Sunday morning pretty great.

Onion and Gruyere Mini Frittatas 
Makes 2 ramekins

3 eggs
1/3 cups whole milk
salt & cracked black pepper, to taste
1/3 cups shredded Gruyere cheese (spring for the good stuff here kids)
2 green onions, cleaned and sliced thinly
1/2 a red onion, diced
1 large clove of garlic, minced
splash of olive oil

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Heat the olive oil in a small saucepan and add the garlic and red onion. Cook for a few minutes over low heat until the onion softens.

In a bowl, whisk together the eggs and milk. Add the salt and pepper, cheese, green onions and garlic/onion mixture. Stir together gently. Pour the mixture into two small buttered ramekins.

Bake for 15 minutes, but start checking at 10 minutes. Take the eggs out when they have puffed up and begun to brown, but when the center still looks too liquid-y. Bake them on a cookie sheet in case of overflow.

CHOCOLATE OLIVE OIL COOKIES WITH SEA SALT

If you run out of eggs, and have no butter, but do find yourself with a serious chocolate craving, you can still make cookies, how's that for good news? These would also be perfect if you needed to bake a dairy-free dessert. The olive oil makes a brownie-like batter. Scoop the dough with a spoon into rounds and sprinkle with coarse sea salt. The result? Fudgy, salty-sweet, soft chocolate cookies.

Chocolate Olive Oil Cookies with Sea Salt
Adapted from Take a Megabite

3/4 cup flour
1/3 cup cocoa (use Valrhona dark if you want to get serious)
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup hot water, plus 2 tablespoons

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together flour, cocoa, baking soda, salt and sugar in a medium bowl. Add oil, water and vanilla. Beat until the batter is stiff (it will have a brownie batter-like consistency).

Drop heaping spoonfuls of the batter on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with coarse or flaked sea salt. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Let cool.