Arepas with Peppers and Eggs: Secret Recipe Club

This is my fifth post for Secret Recipe Club and a very delicious one!!  If you haven't heard about Secret Recipe Club before, then you should definitely check out the website.  Every month a bunch of bloggers get assigned another participating blog to make a recipe from.  This month I had Debbi's blog -- Debbi Does Dinner ... Healthy and Low Calorie.  I had a great time looking through her blog and picking out a recipe to try.  It was hard to narrow it down -- I strongly considered the onion rings, bacon chocolate chip cookies and black bean and corn quinoa.  I finally settled on the arepas with peppers and eggs.  

If you know me, you know how crazy this sounds -- but I actually left bacon out of a recipe.  I love bacon, it makes everything better.  I fully intended to include bacon in the recipe but we forgot to pull it out of the freezer that morning, so it was still frozen solid at dinner time.  Oh well, this recipe was just as great without it.  We topped with pickled red onions we had leftover from a previous recipe, the roasted poblanos and it was a great way to have breakfast for dinner - yum! 

Arepas with Peppers and Eggs 

from Debbie Does Dinner ... Healthy and Low Calorie
serves 4

Ingredients:

2 large poblano chile peppers

1 cup finely ground cornmeal

1 can corn, 15 ounces, drained

salt

1/2 cup shredded colby cheese

1 cup milk

2 Tablespoons butter

vegetable oil

8 eggs, beaten

pickled red onions

Directions:

• Heat broiler to high, put the poblanos under the broiler.  Place under broiler, turning until blackened on all sides.  Place in a glass bowl and cover with plastic wrap.  Let chiles steam in the bowl for 10 minutes.  Peel, seed and chop.
• While chiles are steaming, place cornmeal and corn in a bowl and season with salt.  Add cheese and toss until corn and cheese are coated with cornmeal and distributed evenly.  Warm milk in the microwave, but do not boil.  I usually do 2-3 minutes at half power.  Add the butter to the warm milk to melt it.  Stir the milk mixture into the cornmeal mixture.  Let soak for 10 minutes.  
• Heat a thin layer of oil in a skillet over medium heat.  Add spoonfuls of the cornmeal batter to the hot oil, cooking for 3-4 minutes on the first side and 1-2 minutes on the second side.  Transfer the first batch to a plate when cooked then continue cooking the rest of the batter until all arepas are made.  
• While finishing the last batch of arepas, beat the eggs, seasoning with salt and pepper.  In a medium skillet, cook eggs, scrambled to desired doneness.  
• To serve, put several arepas on a plate, top with eggs, roasted poblanos and pickled onions, if desired.