Shakshuka - brunch

Weekends mornings are best spent: sleeping in, drinking the 11 am lattes, having delicious brunch, while my roomba does the hard work of vacuuming upstairs. While all that's happening, I shall make my laid-back brunch. Today, I'm making Shakshuka. Shakshuka is one of my favorite brunch items to make. It's also definitely also a fun, and almost like a magical word to say. Shak-shu-kah!

Shakshuka is a middle eastern dish that consists mainly of eggs and tomatoes. What makes it amazing are the cheeses and spices you add to it. Have it with toast or as is - both delicious. I love the spices in this dish, you can put in more or less spices as you might like to tailor it to your liking.

What you need:
- 4 eggs
- 1 onion
- 1 bell pepper
- 3 cloves of garlic
- 1 can of chopped tomato, or 2 medium fresh tomato
- 1/2 cup of cheese (cheddar)
- 1/2 tsp of ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp of paprika
- 1 tsp of salt
- black pepper

Recipe:
- cube the vegetables. The fresh vegetables are so pretty, the more colorful the better!
- Stir fry with salt, pepper, cumin and paprika lightly in a fry pan. Stir for 5 min on med, pour into the glass dish.
- gently use a wooden spoon to make a small well, crack an egg in it. Do this 4 times in 4 quadrants of the tomato mixture.
- sprinkle cheese on top, bake 400F for 18-20 min.
- Broil on high for the last 2 min to melt the cheese.
- Serve while hot! I decorated mine with some green onions, not entirely necessary but darn pretty, ain't it?

The goal is to cook the eggs just well enough, however you like it. I tend to under-cook them a little bit as the residual heat will still keep cooking the eggs even when you take the dish out of the oven. If you like your eggs on the runnier end, bake for 15 min instead. If you wait till your eggs are cooked through, they will be hard and over done once you eat the dish.

Next time for brunch, instead of the usual eggs or pancakes, why not try this dish and take a mini trip to the middle east?