Cheese Fondue Breakfast Bake

If you’ve ever cut a whole food group out of your diet before, you know the cravings can sometimes end up being too hard to handle. If you ban fruit for a month, you’ll find yourself dreaming of bananas. Trying to go vegan? Say hello to cravings of fried chicken, eggs and cheese. If you’re embarking on the keto diet, you’ll find the hankerings for bread, pizza, and potatoes unquenchable.

I started the keto diet last July. I was strict keto through October, then the holidays hit. It’s been hard getting back to as strict as I was, but I’m planning on doing it again soon…I swear. The diet makes you feel great, lose weight fast, and have tons of energy.

But, the cravings.

I’m not lying when I say I constantly had dreams about eating burritos, tacos, french fries, etc. I rarely dreamt of sweets—it was mainly the starchy carbs.

The thing I missed most was probably potatoes, but regular ol’ bread and pasta were a close second. It’s not like I would just eat bread by the slice before I went keto, it’s that bread is used in a lot of recipes. From breadcrumbs (meatloaf, meatballs, breading, etc) to chunks of bread for casseroles. It’s hard giving up that King of Starch.

While perusing my collection of recipe boxes, I found this recipe. I had to make it, and tried to think of ways to make it keto.

Could I make keto bread?

Can I just make the casserole minus the bread?

The answers to those questions didn’t satisfy me. In order to make a keto loaf of bread, all the recipes I found online called for crazy ingredients like physillium husk (I ain’t finding that in OKC) or they were just too labor intensive. Making this without the bread would’ve defeated the whole “fondue” vibe—-so I ended up carting a loaf of fresh French bread out of the grocery store and into my kitchen. Keto life be damned!

For the fondue part, I went with two powerfully flavorful, melty cheeses: Gruyere and Emmentaler. You could also use Jarlsberg or Mozzarella, but the two cheeses I used really hit the spot. As soon as I’m done writing this blog post I’ll be chowing down on this breakfast casserole.

Pro-tip: make sure to refrigerate your pre-made casserole for at least 8 hours before baking. I made everything the night before, wrapped it in foil, and then all I had to do was pop it in the oven the next morning. Easy peasy!

Enjoy!

Step-By-Step Instructions

Melt butter in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add shallot and cook for 1 minute.

Add mushrooms and cook until browned, about 3-4 minutes. Stir in thyme, allspice, salt and pepper. Cook until moisture has evaporated, about another 2-3 minutes. Let mushroom mixture cool.

In a large bowl, whisk together milk, eggs, salt and pepper. In a seperate bowl, toss the two cheeses together. Meanwhile, prepare the baking dish. Spray a 13×9″ baking dish with cooking spray. Lay out one layer of French bread chunks.

Sprinkle half of the mushroom mixture on top of the bread. Add half of the cheese on top of that.

Continue with another layer: one layer of bread, one layer of cheese, one layer of mushrooms; ending with cheese.

Pour egg mixture over casserole. Cover and refrigerate for at least 8 hours or overnight.

To bake: preheat oven to 375 degrees. Bake, covered, for 40 minutes.