Egg Muffins with Nettles & Mushrooms
Egg muffins are one of our favorite foods for a quick breakfast or snack. They’re super easy to make and a good way to use your homegrown veggies or foraged foods. As a bonus, egg muffins are high in protein and vegetables, plus naturally low carb, keto, and gluten free!
In this version, I’m using freshly foraged nettle, our homegrown shiitake mushrooms, and fresh eggs from our chickens. If you don’t have nettle, try using spinach in its place and feel free to adapt to your current supply of edible mushrooms on hand.
This recipe removes the sting from nettles, then mixes in flavorful onions, garlic, and mushrooms to result in a savory egg muffin that makes for a delicious addition to breakfast or lunch. Of course, they’re also a wonderful snack!
And as a bonus? They freeze beautifully, and they’re quick and easy to reheat! This recipe can easily be doubled or tripled as needed, so why not make a few extra to pull out for a quick high protein snack or breakfast!
Preparing for the recipe:
Before you start heating up your oven, there are a few things to do first.
Foraging Stinging Nettle
First, of course, you’ll need to forage your stinging nettles. See our article – Foraging Stinging Nettle (+Uses!) – for a guide on how to do this. (Not sure how to ID stinging nettles? Don’t worry, we cover that too!)
The post goes much more in depth, but as a quick run-down: when harvesting your nettles, make sure to avoid any places that have been sprayed by pesticides, herbicides, or exposed to other harmful chemicals.
Additionally, be careful of that sting! We recommend using scissors to snip the nettles directly into a basket, but a heavy pair of gloves is on many people’s must-have list when they set out to harvest this plant.
Finally, for this recipe, make sure you’re only collecting the tender new-growth tips of the nettles, and only from plants that have yet to flower. The new tips are the top 4-6 leaves: see the picture below for an example!
Blanching Stinging Nettles
Before being added to this recipe, the stinging nettles are blanched in order to deactivate the sting.
More detailed instructions on how to do this are in our article about Foraging Stinging Nettle (so be sure to read it for more information), but basically you dip the fresh nettles in boiling water for 4 minutes, then plunge them into an ice bath to cool.
Remember when going to blanch your nettles that they shrink significantly in the process. It’s safer to pick more than you think you’ll need, blanch them, and to have leftovers that you can freeze (or use to make a double batch!) than to not have enough for the recipe!
You’ll want to have 1/2 cup of blanched, chopped stinging nettles per every batch. One batch of this egg muffin recipe makes 5 egg cups.
How to Make Egg Muffins with Stinging Nettle & Mushrooms
Ingredients:
- 1/2 cup chopped blanched stinging nettle tips
- 1/2 cup chopped onion
- 1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
- 1 strip of bacon
- 1/2 tbsp salted butter
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- Salt
- Pepper
- Red pepper flakes
- 3 eggs
- 3 oz cream cheese, softened
- Shredded cheese of your choice (we used cheddar cheese)
Yield: 5 egg muffins
What if I don’t have Stinging Nettles?
While a highlight of this recipe is being able to use freshly foraged stinging nettles, you don’t actually have to have them to make these egg cups! Instead, substitute the blanched nettles with spinach. The flavor will be different, and there will be some amount of textural changes, but they’ll still be delicious!
Equipment:
- Silicone muffin pan (alternatively, silicone muffin liners, placed in a metal muffin pan)
- High-powered blender, such as that you would use for making smoothies
- Skillet
Recipe for Quick Egg Muffins
Preheat your oven to 350Ā° F. Chop your nettles, onions, and mushrooms, and mince your garlic clove. Set aside.
Making the filling:
Pull out your skillet. Fry the strip of bacon, and set aside. Pour off most of the bacon grease, but keep a little in the pan. Put back over the heat, and add your 1/2 tbsp of butter, melting it completely.
Add the onions and mushrooms. Cook over medium-low to medium heat about 5 minutes, stirring to prevent sticking and help them to evenly cook, until they’ve gone golden and soft. This may take more or less time, depending on the heat you’ve set your burner to.
Add the minced garlic clove and stir it in for 30 seconds. Your kitchen should be smelling very aromatic and delicious around now!
Now that the garlic’s gone nice and fragrant, add the stinging nettles. Sprinkle a dash of salt and pepper each, and add a small pinch of red pepper flakes. If desired, add more to taste.
Briefly stir the stinging nettles and spices to combine with the onions, mushrooms, and garlic. Remove from heat – no further cooking required- and set aside.
Making the egg mixture:
Put your eggs and cream cheese together in a blender with a dash of salt. Blend together completely; there should be no lumps of cream cheese left.
Putting it together:
In a silicone muffin pan (or a metal muffin tin lined with silicone liners), divide your mushroom-onion-nettle filling evenly between 5 muffin cups.
At this point, you may also wish to add chopped ham, crumbled cooked sausage or bacon, or other add-ins as desired.
Moving A Bendy Pan
Silicone pans tend to be less than rigid, and sometimes, this leads to unfortunate accidents- such as dumping your entire batch of muffins on the floor!
This issue can be fixed by placing the pan on top of a metal cookie sheet before filling. Then just simply place the cookie sheet, muffin pan on top, in the oven when the time comes to bake.
Over this, sprinkle some shredded cheese. These are delicious with cheddar cheese!
Next, pour your egg mixture over everything. Evenly divide the egg mix between the cups: see the picture below for visual on how full we fill the cups.
Finally, crumble that strip of bacon you fried earlier, and use the pieces to top the egg muffins. The cups are now fully assembled!
Place in the oven to bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until lightly golden brown and the middles are set.
Enjoy! These can be eaten when they’re deliciously hot and fresh from the oven. However, if you happen to have leftovers, they reheat well!
Storage:
You can freeze egg muffin cups, thawing them out in the microwave later for a quick, delicious hot breakfast, snack, or lunch whenever you want them!
To freeze stinging nettle egg cups, let them cool on a wire rack. Once cooled, lay the egg muffins in a single layer in a ziplock bag, or a freezer-safe container. Freeze until completely solid, and keep frozen until you want to eat one!
Frozen egg cups will be good for 1-3 months. If you notice them starting to taste like freezer or accumulating large amounts of ice where they shouldn’t, toss them.
Reheating:
These are easily reheated in the microwave. Time needed will depend on your individual microwave, but to start, zap for 15 seconds, and check. It will more likely than not need more time. Cutting the muffin in half may help speed up the reheating process.
Continue to microwave in short bursts until egg muffin is thawed and hot all the way through the center.
And that’s all there is to it! Enjoy these healthy egg muffins!
Egg Muffins with Nettle (or spinach) & Mushrooms
Equipment
- 1/2 and 1/3 cup measuring cups
- small to medium skillet
- blender
- muffin tin (we use non-stick silicone)
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup chopped blanched stinging nettle tips
- 1/2 cup chopped onion
- 1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
- 1 strip bacon
- 1/2 tbsp salted butter
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- salt
- pepper
- 1 pinch red pepper flakes
- 3 eggs
- 3 oz cream cheese
- 1/3 cup shredded cheese, use more or less to taste (we use cheddar)
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.
- Fry the bacon and set aside. Chop into small pieces once cooled enough to handle.
- Pour off most of the bacon grease, reserving a small amount in the pan.
- Return skillet to heat and add the 1/2 tbsp butter.
- Once the butter has melted, add the onions and mushrooms, cooking over medium to medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, or until they're golden and soft.
- Add the minced garlic and cook for an additional 30 seconds.
- Stir in the chopped stinging nettle, a dash each of salt and pepper, and a small pinch of red pepper flakes.
- Briefly stir to combine then remove from heat and set aside.
- Combine the eggs, cream cheese, and a dash of salt together in a blender. Blend until smooth with no lumps.
- If using a silicone muffin pan, place it on a sturdy baking sheet, to make moving it around much easier.
- Divide the mushroom and onion mixture into 5 muffin cups. (We use a non-stick silicone pan, but if you're using a metal muffin tin, spray or line the cavities before filling.)
- If desired, add extra filling at this step such as chopped ham, bacon bits, crumbled cooked sausage, etc.
- Sprinkle cheese over the top of the filling in each cup.
- Pour the egg and cream cheese mixture over the filling in each muffin cup.
- Top with the chopped bits of bacon you cooked earlier and set aside.
- Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until lightly golden brown and the middles are set.
- Enjoy fresh from the oven, or cool on a wire rack and freeze for 1 to 3 months.
- Reheat in short 10 to 15 second bursts in your microwave until hot in the middle.
Watched your video on yard. Iām so jealous. I live in trailer park. Only thing in full growth now is fox tails.
Hi Linda, Thanks for watching the video! I used to love playing with foxtail weeds as a kid! š