Egg-free sweet potato breakfast casserole

Losing eggs on top of an already narrow plate can feel like the last easy protein disappearing. They were the thing you scrambled without thinking, some mornings the only breakfast you had energy to make, and now that is gone too. This casserole answers that exact gap. You build it once, on a morning when you have a little more time, and it carries you through a run of mornings when you do not.

The base is white Hannah sweet potato, shredded through the whole dish rather than sitting beside it, which keeps this free of nightshades while still tasting like real comfort food. The beta-carotene in sweet potato is what your body turns into vitamin A, a nutrient involved in keeping the mucosal lining of your gut intact. The pork sausage and bacon add the protein and fat that turn this from a workaround into an actual meal, one that holds you until lunch instead of leaving you hunting for a second breakfast by 10.

Ask a butcher, or read a label, and choose meat from a pig that had a decent life. A body owes that much honesty to the animals that feed it. Cut into it while it is still warm, sit down at the table instead of the counter, and give yourself that first quiet minute before the day gets loud.

Ingredients

• 1 lb crumbled pork sausage (compliant, no nightshade spices or added sugar)
• 1 small onion, diced
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 cup coconut milk, plus an additional 1/4 cup in place of the eggs
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 1 1/2 lbs white (Hannah) sweet potatoes, shredded
• 4 strips bacon, cooked and crumbled
• 1/4 cup green onion, sliced

Method

Heat the oven to 375 F. Brown the sausage in a skillet, and crisp the bacon if it is not already cooked, then crumble it and set it aside.

Soften the diced onion in the same pan, add the garlic for about a minute until fragrant, and stir this into the cooked sausage.

In a bowl, combine the coconut milk and the extra 1/4 cup that replaces the eggs with the sea salt. The black pepper from the original is left out, since seed-based spices are set aside during elimination. Fold this into the sausage mixture along with the shredded sweet potato until everything is evenly coated.

Spread the mixture into a 9x9 baking dish, top with the crumbled bacon, and cover with foil. Bake covered for 20 minutes, then uncover and bake about 15 minutes more until the top browns and the casserole is set. Without eggs it sets softer than the original, so let it rest a few minutes before cutting. Garnish with the green onion.

To make ahead, portion and freeze, thaw overnight, and reheat gently.

*Adapted from acleanplate.com*