Breakfast is a must!  But it is often one of the hardest meals to do because it means cooking early in the morning.  Either you are not a morning person (like me) and it is a slow start, or you are crazy busy trying to get the kids off to school AND get yourself out the door to work on time.  Often mornings can be chaotic, let alone trying to plan and cook a healthy breakfast.  Here are some easy, quick breakfast options.  If you take a little time to plan and prep, breakfast can be a cinch.

RECIPE 1:  EASY CLEANOUT THE FRIDGE BREAKFAST HASH

**  Key for fast prep is to cut and prepare veggies ahead of time.

• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 cup red onion, chopped
• 1 cup yellow squash, chopped
• 1/2 cup zucchini, sliced
• salt and pepper
• 1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1 cup fresh spinach, chopped
• 4 eggs, poached or cooked any style

Directions:

Heat large non-stick skillet over medium heat. Add olive oil and butter to pan. Add garlic and onion and saute for 2 minutes, then add chopped squash or your favorite vegetable, cook for 2 more minutes.. Cook for 5-minutes or until almost compete.  At this point add salt and pepper, then add tomatoes and spinach and cook until spinach wilts. Drain well before plating.

While finishing this, prepare eggs to your liking (I like over medium as this is easiest) in another pan.

To serve, drained hash mixture to and then add to individual plates. On top of hash add 2 cooked eggs per person.  This is nice served with some avocado.

NOTE:  Vary your veggies – add peppers, sweet potato, butternut squash, asparagus etc.

RECIPE 2:  NUTS & FRUIT MIX

2 oz sliced almonds, 1 oz chopped pecans and 1 oz walnuts (really any type of nut), fresh fruit chopped, handful of coconut slivers, 1 tsp ground flax, 1 cup Coconut  milk to cover.

Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl.

RECIPE 3:  CHORIZO SCRAMBLED EGGS WITH FRESH SALSA 

• 4 eggs
• Chorizo (no fillers)
• 2 cups fresh spinach

Place chorizo in skillet and brown.  When brown, add fresh spinach and wilt.  As the spinach begins to wilt, add your eggs in a non-stick skillet to scramble. Add about 1 TBSP water to make eggs fluffier.  Scramble all together.

Top Eggs with:Avocado – peeled and sliced, 3 Green onions chopped, 1-2 TBSP fresh salsa

For fresh salsa (make ahead):

• 1 – 16 oz canned tomatoes (just tomatos)
• ¼ Bunch cilantro – washed, stems picked out
• 1 Jalapeno pepper diced/minced

Drain the tomatoes to really dry (set aside).  Put the juice in the blender, place cilantro and jalapeno pepper in the juice.  Blend juice.  Then place tomatoes in and pulse a few times.  Refridgerate.

RECIPE 4:  EGG CUPCAKES

 And finally, has anyone checked out Sarah Fragoso’s Everyday Paleo Egg Cupcakes?  They are easy to make and to batch make for the week.  

Oh, before you shop, read your labels carefully.  Make sure meats are all natural, vegetarian fed and all ingredients are Paleo.  And don’t forget, Yonder Way is a GREAT resource for natural, vegetarian fed protein.  If you haven’t ordered from them before, perhaps now is a great time to try them out.