Garden Omelet

Every morning, even as I'm still breathing heavily from my morning run, I head out to my kitchen garden with a colander and a pair of pruners. It's time for my veggie omelet, a meal I've earned with that long run and all the minutes I’ve spent in the garden up until that moment.

Breakfast is, as they say, the most important meal of the day. This veggie omelet with tons of fresh ingredients from my garden helps me feel fueled and ready for my busy day ahead. (Sadly, the eggs don't come from my garden, but one day, I plan to have chickens!) It's a really simple breakfast that feels gourmet. You can whip it up in just about 10 minutes of cook time.

Here are ingredients you can grow yourself to toss into a omelet to boost both flavor and nutrition, plus step-by-step directions to make my go-to breakfast of gardening champions.

Garden-Fresh Ingredients for Veggie Omelet

Every morning, I walk around my garden looking for ingredients for today's breakfast. Here are some ideas of what you might harvest from your own garden space (indoors and outdoors) throughout the year:

In the Winter:

• broccoli greens and kale from outdoor garden
• microgreens from indoor garden
• sprouts from indoor garden
• garlic greens or green onions from indoor garden

In the spring and fall:

• kale
• Swiss chard
• mustard greens
• spinach
• arugula
• chives
• beet greens
• sugar snap peas or pea shoots

In the summer:

• arugula
• basil
• tomatoes
• bell peppers
• garlic
• onions
• perennial herbs

Bring whatever you've harvested inside and give it a quick rinse in the sink.

Ingredients for Veggie Cheese Omelet

• 3 eggs
• seasonal veggies from the outdoor or indoor garden
• 1/2 tablespoon butter
• salt
• pepper
• freshly grated cheddar cheese (optional)
• Williams Sonoma chili crisp (optional)

Notes:

I love the flavor of shredded sharp cheddar. You could also do pepper jack, Swiss, or mozzarella. In the winter, I love to make a simple green omelet with microgreens and goat cheese. So delicious!

As for the last ingredient, have you tried it? I'm obsessed with Williams Sonoma chili crisp!

Steps to Make a Veggie Omelet

Step 1: Prepare Garden Ingredients

Dice any veggies you're including. Go for at least 2 tablespoons of whatever peppers or tomatoes you wish to include.

Then chop your leafy greens. I like to bunch them all together and then cut into ribbons.

For the chives and other herbs, I highly recommend herb scissors. They make quick work of your smaller garden greens.

Step 2: Wilt Greens

Melt butter in an 8-inch sauté pan over medium heat.

Once the butter's melted, toss any peppers and garden greens you're using into the pan. Sauté until the greens are wilted, about 3 to 5 minutes, depending on the vegetables you chose.

Step 3: Whisk Eggs

While the greens are softening, crack the eggs into a bowl and whisk until smooth. (The egg yolks and whites should be completely mixed together.)

Step 4: Add Eggs

As soon as the greens start to wilt, season with a dash of salt and pepper. Toss in tomatoes, if you're using them.

Now it's time to add the eggs. A lot of recipes have you start over in a separate pan, but I just pour the whisked eggs right on top of the veggies. Everything is incorporated into the eggs, instead of you having to worry about a heavy filling. Trust me on this one! Plus, it's less cleanup!

Step 5: Cook the Eggs

Cook until the bottom of the eggs have a nice, firm texture, about 2 to 3 minutes. Use a spatula to gently push an edge of the egg up while tilting the pan to allow the runny top to flow underneath. Repeat this around the edge of the pan until there's no liquid left. (This is my hack to avoid having to flip the entire omelet!)

Step 6: Add the Cheese

Add desired toppings like cheddar cheese and some Williams Sonoma chili crisp. Allow the cheese to melt.

Step 7: Fold the Omelet

Use your spatula to fold the omelet in half or into thirds. It's sometimes easiest to slide half of the omelet out of the pan and onto a large dinner plate, and then fold the remaining half over itself.

Serve and Enjoy!

Season with more salt and pepper, if desired. While my omelet is still steaming hot, I jazz it up with even more nutrition and flavor. The two things I love to add are small greens and something fermented.

For small greens, I add a couple pinches of microgreens or sprouts, whatever I'm growing. Currently, I've been piling on fresh alfalfa sprouts (grown in my Gardenary Sprout Kit).

For something fermented, I like to add some red beet and red cabbage kraut or some lacto-fermented onions. It's so good for your gut to add fermented foods to your diet.

And voila! A super nutritious breakfast!

Serve immediately.

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Time to Whisk Some Eggs!

To me, this omelet is perfection. I can't dive fast enough into this gooey, yummy goodness. I love the savoriness of the egg and cheese with the slight bitterness of the garden greens, the spice of the chili crisp, and the tang of the kraut. Even more, having the sprouts on top makes you feel like you're eating the freshest food possible—and you literally can't get fresher!

When you pull a couple ingredients from your garden, it's like a full-circle meal. Tiny seeds you planted months ago turned into stems and leaves and fruit you've tended for weeks. And now, this plate full of nutrition will fuel your body for more runs, more trips out to the garden to keep planting.

And more planting means there are more delicious omelets in your future.