Parentella

A few weeks ago, inspired by a post on Charlie Bakes, I treated my family to their first ever Dutch Baby. A Dutch Baby is a large pancake, usually baked in a pie pan, that puffs up to enormous heights. My kids delighted in watching the batter balloon up in the oven and then deflate when I cut into it, but they delighted even more in eating it.

Dutch Babies are usually served at breakfast, but when I saw my children’s enthusiasm for the dish, I decided to play around with the recipe a bit to make it into an easy, savory week night meal. After a few tries, I came up with this hearty ham and cheese version of the dish. When paired with a green salad, it easily satisfies our whole family.

Ham and Cheese Dutch Baby

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients:

• 4 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup flour
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 8 oz. ham, diced
• 1/2 cup cheddar cheese, grated

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Place a 9 x 13 inch baking dish (or something similar in size) on a middle rack to heat along with the oven. Make sure that there isn’t  a rack above the one your dish is on because the Dutch Baby will puff up quite a bit.

Beat the eggs with an electric mixer on medium speed until they’re pale yellow. Add in milk and flour and beat a little longer until the batter is smooth. Let the batter rest a couple of minutes while you dice the ham and grate the cheese.

Once the oven and the baking dish are hot, put the butter in the pan and swirl it around until it’s completely melted and covers the bottom of the pan. Pour in the batter, then sprinkle it evenly with ham and cheese.

Bake for 15 minutes, until golden brown and puffy. Slice into wedges and serve with a salad or steamed veggies.

Serves 2 adults and 2 kids.

Variations:

The variations on Dutch Babies are endless. The basic ratio of the recipe is 1 egg: 1/4 c. flour: 1/4 c. milk so the recipe is easy to double or cut in half. I sometimes will divide the batter between two pie plates and put different toppings on each. A few ideas for variations:

• Halved grape tomatoes and goat cheese
• Leftover cooked zucchini and peppers with swiss cheese
• Raspberries or blueberries — frozen berries work fine
• Add 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon to the batter and then top with thin slices of apple
• Bake the Dutch Baby with no toppings, then sprinkle it with powdered sugar and let your family squeeze lemon on their portions at the table

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Wendy Copley writes about cooking, crafts, parenting and her obsession with lunch boxes at Wendolonia.

Related posts:

1. School Night Dinner: BBQ Chicken, Mashed Yams and Peas
2. Thanksgiving Menu Must Have Recipes
3. Snack Ideas — Part 2
4. Snack Ideas – Part 1
5. Affordable Homemade Gift for Your Teachers

Tags: easy dinners, fast, healthy meals

This entry was posted on Friday, January 14th, 2011 at 12:01 am and is filed under Food, Wendy Copley. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.