A couple months ago, my friend Carmen was telling me about this new trick she found for poaching eggs in a mug in the microwave. And as part of that story, she mentioned that she served them over a sweet potato hash that she made with onions, red peppers and spinach – oh and of course sweet potatoes. I happened to be working from home that day and it was about lunch time, which is probably why we were talking about food, and I also happened to have everything I needed to whip this up. So I decided to give it a try, and boy am I glad I did.
I tried Carmen’s egg poaching trick the first time I made this, and got 1 really good egg, and on the 2nd try got a 2nd not too bad egg. I’ll eventually figure this trick out – I think it’s a matter of smaller time increments and knowing my microwave. But for the meantime, I have resorted to just using an over easy egg. I just cook it in the same pan that I used to cook the hash and no extra dishes are created.
The yolk creates this luscious, creamy, rich sauce for the hash once you break into it. And by eating grated sweet potatoes with all the veggies, I feel like this is a virtually guilt free lunch. It also happened to be a great lunch to make during Lent – which I did on at least 3 Fridays this year.
You can customize this with whatever other veggies you like and have on hand.
Oh – and did I mention that this dish comes together in about 20 minutes or less?
Here’s what I used:
The crumbled cheese you see there is queso fresco, feta would also work if you don’t have access to queso fresco although it will be a little saltier.
Start by grating the sweet potato. I washed it and left the skin on. After banging my knuckles on the counter using my box grater, I decided to use it at an angle which saved my knuckles and still worked out well.
Toss the grated sweet potato in a 10 inch skillet with a little olive oil and some salt.
Cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes.
When the sweet potato starts to soften but isn’t fully cooked. Add some diced red onion, and red bell pepper – about a ¼ c each.
Stir together and cook for about 5 minutes until the pepper and onion begin to soften.
Throw in a large handful of spinach – about a cup – during the last minute. It’s going to look like a lot.
But it’s going to cook down into the perfect amount.
Once the spinach wilts, transfer to a plate and top with some crumbled queso fresco cheese.
Heat a little butter in the same sauce pan and over medium-low heat, fry two eggs. Ensure that you leave the yolk nice and runny.
Serve the eggs on top of the hash.
Don’t be afraid to crack into that yolk.
- 1 medium sweet potato, grated
- 1 T olive oil
- ¼ c red onion, diced
- ¼ c red bell pepper, diced (about a half a pepper)
- 1 c baby spinach
- ¼ c queso fresco
- 2 poached or fried eggs
- Salt & pepper
- Heat the olive oil in a pan over medium heat. Add the sweet potato, season with some kosher salt and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring periodically.
- Add the onions and bell pepper and cook for 4 more minutes.
- Add the spinach and cook for another minute until the spinach wilts.
- Remove hash to a plate and top with queso fresco.
- Fry two eggs in some butter in the same pan you used to cook the hash. Or poach two eggs.
- Top hash with fried eggs.
- Season with salt and pepper.
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