Egg Muffins

Gluten free egg muffins that keep four days in the fridge. Pull them before they brown and squeeze the spinach dry so they do not go rubbery.

Makes

6 lunches, two each

Hands on

15 min

Start to finish

45 min

Keeps

4 days in the fridge

• 10large eggs
• 1/4 cupwhole milk
• 4 cupsbaby spinach, packedOr a cup of frozen chopped spinach, thawed. Either one has to be squeezed until it stops giving up water.
• 1 cupshredded cheddarPre-shredded is fine. Read one bag per brand.
• 1/2 cupdiced ham or cooked crumbled baconOptional, and the likeliest place wheat or barley hides in this recipe.
• 1/2 teaspoonsalt
• black pepper
• butter or oil for the panNot a baking spray. Some baking sprays contain flour.

1. Heat the oven to 325F and grease a 12 cup muffin pan thoroughly, including the flat surface between the cups where the egg spreads as it rises.
2. Wilt the spinach in a dry skillet for about 2 minutes, or thaw the frozen spinach. Tip it into a strainer, press it with a spoon, then wring it in a clean kitchen towel until no more water comes out. Chop it.
3. Whisk the eggs, milk, salt and pepper for about 30 seconds, until the color is even but the mixture is not foamy.
4. Divide the spinach, cheese and ham between the cups, then pour the egg over until each cup is about three quarters full.
5. Bake 18 to 22 minutes and take them out while the tops are still pale and matte and the centers are set. A browned, domed top means they went too far.
6. Cool in the pan 5 minutes, run a thin knife around each one and lift them onto a rack. Let them cool completely before they go in the fridge, or condensation collects underneath.

1. Pack two cold in a container that fits them snugly. Loose ones roll and the edges crumble by lunch.
2. Put a folded paper towel underneath. Cold egg sweats in a closed container and the towel takes care of it.
3. They are eaten with fingers, which is the real advantage over a container of scrambled egg at a twenty minute table.
4. Send something sharp alongside, a few pickles or cherry tomatoes. Cold egg on its own tastes flat.
5. They need an ice pack. Egg does not hold at backpack temperature the way a sandwich does.

• They are shrunken and rubbery. The oven ran hot, or they stayed in until the tops browned.
• There is a wet layer under the muffins. The spinach was not wrung out.
• They tore coming out of the pan. Only the inside of the cups was greased, not the flat top where the egg spread as it rose.
• They taste like nothing. Ten eggs got a pinch of salt, and cold food needs more salt than warm food does.

Eggs, spinach and cheese carry no gluten. Everything you add to them is where to look. Deli ham, breakfast sausage, precooked sausage crumbles and imitation bacon bits are the usual places wheat or barley turns up as a filler or a flavor carrier. US labels have to declare wheat, so it shows up in a Contains line, but barley and rye do not have to be declared that way, so read the ingredients for malt, malt extract and barley as well. Pre-shredded cheese is coated with an anti caking agent, almost always potato starch or cellulose here, worth one look on a brand you have not bought before. Last one, and it catches people: baking sprays sold for cakes contain flour, so grease the pan with butter, oil or a plain oil spray.