Southern Breakfast Napoleons for the Royal Foodie Joust

This is my entry for this month's Royal Foodie Joust hosted by The Leftover Queen. The Joust can be found on the Queen's forum.

After a brief hiatus, The Royal Foodie Joust is back! The ingredients this round are:
eggs      greens      cheese

After seeing the choices I thought, "piece of cake." Well, not really. I mean, I had no plans to make cake with these ingredients. Although...

It turns out that these simple ingredients ended up being more challenging than some of the more uncommon ingredients from past Jousts. Funny how that happens.

I made desserts for the other Jousts I participated in and wanted to do something different this time. (Come to think of it, making dessert out of eggs, cheese, and greens would have been "different.") I also wanted to try and remain true to the overall focus of my blog (Cajun, Creole, and Southern food).

I've been off topic a lot lately with Cinco de mayo and such. But like everyone else, we eat a variety of foods and not solely one style!

My interpretation of this month's ingredients:

Southern Breakfast Napoleons

While I don't care much for greens, they ended up being my inspiration since they are so very Southern, ya'll.

The eggs and greens are obvious in the picture. The cheese is incorporated in the grits cakes. Mmmmm. Grits. Double Mmmm. Cheese grits.
 

If you've been reading along, you know I didn't touch an egg so...um... undercooked. This was The Husband's plate. My egg was over, over-hard.

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Southern Breakfast Napoleons
from Ms. enPlace

For the grits (make ahead):
1 cup chicken broth or stock
2 cups water
salt and pepper, to taste
¾ cup quick cook grits (not instant)
½-3/4 c sharp cheddar cheese

Bring broth, water, salt and pepper to a boil. Slowly add grits and whisk to incorporate. Cook for about 5 minutes, or until grits have absorbed the liquid and are tender. Turn off the heat and stir in the cheese until melted. Pour into an 8 x 8 baking dish (heat safe). Cover and chill several hours or overnight.
After chilling, cut into 4 pieces. While you prepare the rest of the ingredients, slowly heat the grits cakes in a non-stick skillet.


For the greens:
2 slices bacon, chopped in ½” pieces
heaping ¼ c diced onion
1 clove garlic, minced
10 oz bag of spinach (or use your favorite type of greens)—reserve about 5 leaves for garnish, if desired
salt & pepper, to taste
pinch of cayenne pepper

In a large pot, cook the bacon until almost crisp. While the bacon cooks, wash and drain the spinach. Add the chopped onion to the pot and sauté until tender. Add the garlic and sauté for a couple of minutes. Add the spinach and toss to coat with bacon drippings. Season with salt, pepper, and cayenne. Cook until wilted.

For the eggs:
butter, oil, or bacon drippings (I won’t judge)
4 eggs
salt & pepper to taste

This is prettiest with a fried egg; however feel free to cook your egg any way you like.

Heat a pat of butter in a small frying pan (or heat oil or bacon drippings if you prefer). When hot, crack on egg into the pan. Season with salt and pepper and cook until set (or as set as you like). Repeat with remaining eggs.

To assemble:
You’ll need the following:
heated cheese grits cakes
cooked spinach/greens
fried eggs
reserved spinach leaves, cut chiffonade style (if desired)
hot sauce (if desired)

Place the heated cheese grits cakes on 4 warm plates. Top each with a mound of spinach. Gently place a fried egg over each. Add a few dashes of hot sauce to each egg (or pass at the table). Scatter spinach chiffonade over each egg.