Ooh La La Frittata!

Once again on my quest for recipes that are meatless miracles, I have turned to the humble yet elegant frittata. The beauty of the frittata is that you can be as simple or as complex as you'd like. As long as you have eggs, you can basically work with anything you have in the fridge - red or green bell peppers, any type of cheese, greens, chicken sausage - you name it.

Inspired by the fresh pick'ins at my local farmstand, I decided to try this recipe from Bon Appetit (Feb 2008) and leverage their fresh picked asparagus and leeks. I used Gruyere cheese instead of the Fontina because I happened to have some in the fridge and it was excellent. A few other tricks:

• I omitted the butter and used a small amount of olive oil instead.
• I omitted the parmesan cheese.
• I find broiling very tricky to get right so rather than broil, I made it entirely on the stove top. I used my new frittata pan from Williams Sonoma (highly recommended) which is two interlocking pans that enable you to flip the frittata, but if you don't have a special pan you simply cook the frittata longer on one side, cover it with a dinner plate, quickly invert the frittata on to the dinner plate (you might want to loosen the edges with a spatula first to make this easier), then slide the frittata back into the pan you were working with to cook the underside. This is less complicated than it seems.
• I added some thyme from my herb garden. Asparagus and thyme work well together.
• You won't need a full bunch of asparagus and the thinner stalks work better for this recipe. Evaluate the stalks in your bunch, use the thinnest ones for this recipe, and save the thick ones for grilling or roasting another night. If you are working with thicker asparagus cook the asparagus first for a few minutes, then add the leeks to that mixture since the leeks won't take as long to cook.
• I left out the mushrooms because I have been doing the asparagus/shitake combo a lot these days and wanted a change.

I served it with stuffed tomatoes as a side dish - a super-yummy and very healthy concoction. I slice the bottom side of the tomato off so it can rest on the top side where it connected to the vine. I then scoop out the tomato innards (is there a word for that? "Guts" sounded too gross) and put them in a bowl. I mince some garlic and shallots and saute them in olive oil over med-low heat until they soften, then add washed, chopped greens to the saute pan. My current favorite is swiss chard because it is in peak season (don't use the stems!) but arugula, spinach...really any green at all would work. I saute the greens until they are very wilted, then I add them to the bowl with the tomato innards. I season the mixture with a little kosher salt and pepper, stir in a small touch of goat cheese (any cheese would do) to add a little creaminess to it, then stuff the mixture back into the hollowed out tomatoes and bake them in the oven at 350 for around 25-30 minutes. This is a great side dish to get creative with, or could serve as a nice lunch option when paired with a salad.

Frittata Ingredients:

2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter
1 cup chopped leeks (white and pale green parts only)
1 12-ounce bunch thin asparagus, trimmed, cut on diagonal into 1-inch pieces (about 2 1/2 cups)
1 cup sliced stemmed shiitake mushrooms
8 large omega-3 eggs
1 cup diced Fontina cheese, divided
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Preparation:

Preheat broiler. Melt butter in heavy broilerproof 10-inch-diameter nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add leeks and sauté 4 minutes. Add asparagus and shiitake mushrooms, sprinkle lightly with salt, and sauté until tender, about 6 minutes. Whisk eggs, 3/4 cup Fontina cheese, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper in medium bowl. Add egg mixture to skillet; fold gently to combine. Cook until almost set. Sprinkle remaining 1/4 cup Fontina cheese and Parmesan cheese over. Broil until frittata is puffed and cheese begins to turn golden, about 3 minutes. Cut into wedges and serve.