Just Bento

Frittata, a thick Italian omelette, is an egg dish that’s great hot or cold. It’s perfect picnic fare, which means it’s also great for bento. The usual frittata recipe calls for baking it in the oven, but it’s hard to find the time to heat up the oven and then bake something on a weekday morning. This method of cooking it on the stovetop appeared in the April issue of kyou no ryouri (Today’s Cooking) magazine. The total cooking time is only about 10-15 minutes.

The original recipe just used broccoli, but I used a mix of steamed broccoli and the ever-useful red pepper and onion confit . You could make it with any cooked vegetable mix, so it’s a great way of using up leftovers. You could add chopped up leftover meat to this too if you like. Cheap, frugal and tasty!

Recipe: Stovetop frittata with leftover vegetables

Makes 2 to 4 portions.

• 4 eggs
• 1 cup chopped up cooked vegetables - rather overcooked, limp vegetables are fine for this
• 1 Tbs. grated sharp cheese such as Parmesan or Grana Padano
• Salt and pepper
• Olive oil

Equipment needed: a small non-stick frying pan, a larger nonstick frying pan

Take any combination of pre-cooked chopped up vegetables, or use a frozen vegetable mix.. Heat up the larger frying pan and put in the vegetables with no added oil, and stir around rapidly to evaporate as much moisture as you can, scraping off any bits that get stuck. Season if necessary with a little salt and pepper. Set aside. (You can do this part ahead of time.)

Heat up the smaller frying pan with about 1/2 Tbs. of olive oil. Beat the eggs with the cheese, salt and pepper. Pour the egg into the hot pan, and let cook about 30 seconds, then put in the vegetables, spreading out evenly.

Lower the heat to medium-low and put on a lid, and let cook for about 5 minutes. Turn over, replace lid and cook for an additional 2-3 minutes.

Take off the heat and cut into wedges.

You can make this the night before. It will keep well-wrapped in the refrigerator for a couple of days.

• See also: An oven baked frittata with tofu cubes