potato frittata

i've been reading alexis stewart's blog ever since she got it going after she quit the whatever radio blog (loved her portion of it, too). she frequently makes frittatas of all vegetarian sorts (all her food is vegetarian). while at the cottage i came across one of mom's very old cast iron pans which got me thinking...

this isn't exactly a recipe (what else is new?) but sort of adaptation of several, and collection what mom had (that needed to be used soon) in the fridge: potato, fennel, onion and ham frittata with chives.

first, crank the oven to 225C and place your well seasoned cast iron 9"/20cm pan into the cold oven. if using any other kind of pan, please, make sure its handle can hold the heat of the oven (you really don't want a smelly plastic meltdown in your oven) (trust me).

i was making this for 3 persons. i sliced 6 smallish potatoes, chopped one medium white onion, one fennel and 100gr of ham (totally optional).

cracked 6 eggs into a bowl, added 1dl of grated swiss cheese, and later on approx 2 tbsp of chopped chives.

first sauteed (with a view!) the fennel and onion until translucent, removed them onto a plate...

...browned the ham and placed it next to onion/fennel mixture.

by this time the oven and pan in it were hot. carefully oil the hot pan, place half of the potatoes on the bottom...

...then layer the onion, fennel, ham and rest of the potatoes in the pan. be careful, you really don't want any more burn marks on your hands (i didn't either)...

...then mix the eggs, cheese and chives and pour the mixture onto pan, shake a little to make it go everywhere.

place the pan into the oven and bake for 15 mins.

let the frittata rest for a few minutes before slicing it. i'm told that frittatas are good cold as well, we ate all of this warm...