Frittata in a cast iron skillet with a few slices taken out on plates to the side.
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Spinach, Bacon, Green Onion, and Cheddar Frittata

Frittata is a great, easy meal for busy weeknights. Sauté a few things on the stovetop, pour in your eggs & milk, and bake until golden.

Frittata in a cast iron skillet with a few slices taken out on plates to the side.

Why we love this to make this spinach frittata recipe

  • Frittata recipes require only a handful of ingredients, and they’re really versatile!
  • It’s great at any time of the day – breakfast, lunch, or dinner!
  • Frittata cooks quickly. Just sauté your ingredients on the stovetop, add your eggs, and transfer it to the oven to finish.
  • You can use it as an excuse to clean out the fridge! Use odds and ends from your produce and deli drawer to make a tasty combination for your frittata.
  • You can serve it right in the pan you cook it in. Less dishes to clean up later on!
  • A little freshly grated nutmeg is the perfect accompaniment for leafy greens. It enhances the flavor of the spinach beautifully in this frittata recipe.
  • Bacon + cheddar is always a win at our table.

Spinach, eggs, green onion, cheddar cheese, bacon, milk, nutmeg, salt, and pepper on a butcher block.

My family absolutely loves spinach, even my son.

It’s such a nutritious ingredient, and I love finding ways to pack it into our meals wherever I can.

But if you’ve ever worked with cooking baby spinach, you know that you can take a mountain of it and it cooks down to barely anything.

Still, it’s a great ingredient and it adds great flavor and texture to this easy spinach, bacon, green onion, and cheddar frittata recipe.

One of my husband’s all-time favorite foods is quiche, and frittata is like the lower maintenance cousin of quiche.

That makes it a weeknight win in my book!

Looking for more frittata recipes? This squash blossom frittata and this zoodle frittata are great options.

Two wedges of spinach, bacon, green onion, and cheddar frittata with toasted English muffin slices.

🍳 What’s the Difference: Frittata vs. Quiche

Eggs have got to be one of the most versatile ingredients in anyone’s kitchen arsenal.

They’re the main component of so many dishes, including 2 often confused items: frittata and quiche.

The main difference between frittata and quiche is the crust. Frittata doesn’t have a crust, but quiche almost always does.

Quiche is usually poured into a savory pie crust and baked. Since it has the stability of a crust to hold things together, the filling often has more liquid, like cream, in the mixture.

Frittata almost always has milk or cream mixed in with the eggs to help make the final texture nice and fluffy.

There is also crustless quiche, but in general, a quiche cooks more slowly than a frittata.

A frittata can be cooked fully on the stovetop or, like in this recipe, started on the stovetop and transferred to the oven to finish cooking until the eggs are set.

I prefer to do the stovetop/oven combination method as it eliminates the need to flip the frittata like when it’s cooked strictly on the stovetop.


Hand cracking an egg into a small bowl.


How to make this recipe

  1. Cook bacon in a cast iron skillet (or other oven-safe skillet), reserving some of the drippings.
  2. Sauté the white part of your green onions and spinach in the skillet, seasoning with freshly grated nutmeg.
  3. Whisk together egs, milk, salt, and pepper in a large bowl.
  4. Pour egg mixture over the spinach.
  5. Top with cheese, remaining green onions, and crumbled bacon.
  6. Bake until set and lightly golden.

Pouring milk into a large measuring cup with eggs.
Whisking milk and eggs together.
Pouring eggs and milk into a cast iron skillet with spinach.


🥓 Pro Tip: Use Kitchen Scissors to Cut Bacon

Kitchen scissors are one of my favorite tools to use while cooking.

When cutting things, I don’t want to use the same scissors that we use for other, non-food items around the house.

For things like bacon, I usually cut the slices in half before cooking. It makes the size of the bacon better for most sandwiches, and it’s easier to store any leftovers.

When making this frittata recipe, I used my kitchen scissors to cut each slice of bacon in half so I could fit them all in my skillet.

Cutting bacon over a cast iron skillet with kitchen scissors.
Bacon being cut with kitchen scissors over a cast iron skillet.
Bacon in a cast iron skillet.

We’ve always had a dedicated set of scissors to be used for cooking, and the ones I love most are these OXO kitchen scissors.

The stainless steel blades are sharp and they separate completely for easy cleaning. You can use them individually to chop things if you want, too!

The handles are soft and comfortable, and there’s even an herb stripper in the center.

I really love them – if you’re in the market for kitchen scissors, I highly recommend these!

Spinach, bacon, green onion, and cheddar frittata in a cast iron skillet.

What to serve with your frittata

Once your frittata is set, pull it out of the oven and serve it right from the skillet you cooked it in.

For a light meal, you can serve it with a toasted English muffin, fresh fruit, or cottage cheese.

If you want something more substantial, a green salad and fried potatoes or hashbrowns would be great alongside.

You could also reserve the bacon that you fry up and serve it alongside the frittata instead of in it.

Spinach, bacon, green onion, and cheddar frittata with toasted English muffin.

In all honesty, when we have frittata for dinner, we tend to eat 2 slices each, so just a small side is plenty.

For the photos in this post, I served the frittata with a sourdough English muffin from one of my favorite locally run small businesses, Dam Good English Muffins.

I split and toasted it and then cut it into 6 strips so we could each have 2 pieces. It was the perfect amount. My son slathered his in jam and me and my husband enjoyed ours plain.

Close-up of a fork taking a piece from a spinach, bacon, green onion, and cheddar frittata.

The texture of this frittata is soooo nice and fluffy. The first time I made it (back in 2012!), I used a 10-inch cast iron skillet, and it was taller and fluffier.

For the photos in this post, I used a 12-inch skillet, which worked out well, but the final product was a bit thinner.

The good news is that it cooked up faster than when I used the small skillet.

The next time I make this, I’ll go back to the 10-inch skillet, because we liked the thicker one a bit better.

Either way you do it, it’s going to be delicious!

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Frittata in a cast iron skillet with a few slices taken out on plates to the side.

Spinach, Bacon, Green Onion, and Cheddar Frittata

  • Author: Big Flavors from a Tiny Kitchen – Ashley Covelli
  • Prep Time: 5 minutes
  • Cook Time: 38 minutes
  • Total Time: 43 minutes
  • Yield: 68 Slices 1x
  • Category: Breakfast
  • Method: Stovetop, Oven
  • Cuisine: American

Description

Frittata is a great, easy meal for busy weeknights. Sauté a few things on the stovetop, pour in your eggs & milk, and bake until golden.


Ingredients

Units Scale
  • 4 strips of thick-cut bacon
  • 1/4 cup thinly sliced green onions, about 2 small, whites and greens separated
  • 3 ounces baby spinach
  • 1/8 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg (optional)
  • 6 large eggs
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
  • 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
  2. Lay bacon strips flat in a single layer in the bottom of a 10- or 12-inch cast iron skillet. Turn the heat on medium and cook until crisp, flipping occasionally, about 15-20 minutes total. Remove bacon from pan and set aside to cool, reserving 1 tablespoon drippings in the pan.
  3. Add the white parts of the green onions to the reserved bacon drippings and cook until they start to soften, about 1 minute. Add the baby spinach and nutmeg and cook until wilted down, about 2 minutes longer. Turn off heat.
  4. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, salt, and pepper. Pour mixture into the skillet over the spinach. Sprinkle cheddar cheese on top, along with the remaining green onions. Crumble the bacon strips over top and transfer to the preheated oven.
  5. Bake until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean, about 20-25 minutes, depending on the size of your skillet.


Notes

If you don’t have a cast iron skillet, use any oven-safe skillet that you have.

A 12-inch cast iron skillet makes a thinner, more quick-cooking frittata. A 10-inch cast iron skillet makes a thicker, fluffier frittata that will take a few more minutes to cook.

Nutrition

  • Serving Size: 1 slice
  • Calories: 161
  • Sugar: 1.9 g
  • Sodium: 318.2 mg
  • Fat: 11.2 g
  • Saturated Fat: 5 g
  • Carbohydrates: 3 g
  • Fiber: 0.3 g
  • Protein: 11.8 g
  • Cholesterol: 162.1 mg

Keywords: frittata, brunch, easy dinner

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Ashley Covelli is a food photographer, recipe developer, and culinary instructor based in Ossining, New York. She loves helping people become enthusiastic and adventurous in the kitchen so that they can build skills and confidence to cook for themselves and their loved ones. She can almost always be found with at least 3 different beverages within arm's reach.

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