the goose goofs off: the goose loves monkey bread and baked eggs

So I'm still behind in posts, but slowly catching up. This one is from a few weeks ago.

On weekdays, my morning routine is sparse - I sleep as long as I can and get up just in time to get the basics done - hair, makeup, clothing, shoes, and fill my coffee thermos. Luckily, my sweet husband does the puppy duties and makes my coffee, which makes the morning even smoother.

But on the weekends, we have a chance to get up slowly and drink coffee out of mugs and spend time on breakfast. A couple Saturdays ago, I was thoroughly enjoying my coffee and searching for a scrumptious breakfast idea when I came across the following two photos (sources in caption link):

Caprese Baked Egg Cups


Mini Monkey Bread

The first recipe was from a blog I follow fairly regularly called How Sweet It is. I've made several of her recipes, and they always turn out fabulously.

The second recipe is for personalized servings of the infamous Monkey Bread, which is simply refrigerator rolls (or dough, if you're fancy and don't buy the easy stuff) cut into pieces, coated in cinnamon-sugar-butter, and baked. Yes, please!

I decided these two would be the best. First, the eggs would be great single servings of protein, keeping us fuller longer. (I sound like a mom!) I knew I had to make the monkey bread for several reasons:

1) I had a tube of rolls in the fridge that needed to be used
2) I'd been wanting to make monkey bread for a long time
3) I love all things small and mini, with monkey bread being no exception
4) How can you go wrong with cinnamon, sugar, and butter??

For an official recipe, I'd Google it or Pinterest it (yeah, that's a verb now), or search on All Recipes.com. Since I only had one can of dough instead of several, I reduced the amounts for all ingredients. But I'll tell you what I did.

I sliced my biscuits in quarters and mixed about a tablespoon of cinnamon with about a fourth cup of brown sugar and a fourth cup of white sugar. (Maybe a little less sugar?) I then coated my biscuits with the sugar mixture.

Then I switched gears and sliced my ingredients for the baked egg cups. The recipe is Caprese style, with tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella, but I didn't have those ready, so I went for Greek cups instead. I used sundried tomatoes, feta, kalamata olives, and some parsley I had on hand.

Meanwhile, I spread my biscuit pieces between six regular-size muffin cups. I melted about 2 tablespoons of butter along with more cinnamon and about two tablespoons of brown sugar, and drizzled some of that melty syrup over each filled muffin tin. Then in the oven they went, at 350 for about 20 minutes.

So back to the egg cups. I pulled out some small bowls and started with half the olives, sundried tomatoes, and feta in the bottom.

Then I cracked my eggs on top, without beating them. I added a little more feta and sprinkled my parsley over the top. You can also add salt/pepper at this point - I just added a little pepper since the feta and olives are plenty salty.

Then in the toaster oven they went, at about 350 for 8 minutes.

While I was busy with the eggs, my mini monkey breads baked beautifully to golden perfection.

One tube of dough made six monkey muffins, so if you're prepping for a party, multiply appropriately. I'd guess that two to three muffins per guest is appropriate, depending on what else you're serving!

Yuummmmm.

A few pretty shots...

Five monkey muffins, sitting on a plate.

Look at those gooey bottoms. They'll stick to the place if you don't eat them fast enough...!

Crusty, golden, flaky, sticky, sweet...

Don't forget about the eggs! After baking for about 8 minutes, I broiled at 400 for two minutes more, to get crispy tops. Watch the yolks, though, if you like them runny. Don't broil too long.