One of the few remaining good food magazines is Culture Cheese Mag, to which we've subscribed for more than ten years. Because we love cheese. And one of the things that Culture does periodically is reader giveaways; we've actually won twice, once a decade ago, and once this month. What do they give away? Well, cheese, of course.

This month's contest was six assorted cheeses from Widmer's Cheese Cellars in Wisconsin. It included a butterkase, "Alpine" cheddar, mild cheddar, colby jack, brick cheese, and cheese spread. After a little recipe searching, we have plans for this cheese.

The mild cheddar was used for sandwiches. I'll use the brick cheese for Detroit pizza, the butterkase for spaetzle, and the colby for quesadillas. My sweetie used the "Alpine" cheddar for ... a souffle!

Since this was for a casual weeknight dinner, she cooked Jacques Pépin's maman's souffle. Mme. Pépin's is a great recipe; it's easier, faster, and doesn't dirty as many dishes. That's because she doesn't separate the eggs. According to Jacques, when she got married she didn't really know how to cook, so she made a souffle ... but she didn't know to separate the eggs. And it worked anyways! It's a little less fluffy than a beaten-egg-white souffle, but still quite good and great for an easy meal.

Even though you haven't won free cheese, I know you'll want to make one too, so here's a recipe:

Jacques Pépin's Maman's Cheese Souffle

• 6 Tbs unsalted butter, plus more for greasing
• 6 Tbs all-purpose flour
• 2 cups whole milk
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 5 large eggs
• 9 ounces grated cheese (see below), plus optionally 1oz in thin slices.
• 1/2 oz parmesan cheese or similar
• 2 tablespoons minced chives
• bowl, whisk, medium pot, 2qt wide baking pan or gratin dish

Heat oven to 375F.

Melt the 6 Tbs butter in the pan. Whisk in the flour until well combined. Cook over medium heat for around a minute. Pour in the milk (cold is fine), whisking. Cook, whisking frequently, until the milk begins to simmer and the white sauce becomes thick. Remove from the heat and season with salt and pepper, and stir in the cheese. Set aside to cool for 10-15 min.

Grease the baking pan with butter. Powder it with the parmesan until lightly coated.

Whisk the eggs in a bowl until well beaten and fairly frothy. Add the minced chives. Whisk the cheesy white sauce into the eggs, and then pour the mixture into the baking pan. If using, decorate with a few more chives plus the slices of cheese.

Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, until puffed up, brown all over the top surface, and completely done. This souffle can be a bit soupy in the middle, so if you don't care for that (we don't), cook it for another 3 minutes or so after you think it's already done.

Serve very hot, with a simple vinagrette salad.

Note on cheese: this souffle works best with a semi-soft, melty cheese with a medium-strong flavor, such as cheddar, swiss, gruyere, gouda, manchego, raclette, or kasseri. It will not work well with a blue cheese due to the higher fat content.

Several years ago, on Haight Street, there used to be an Eritrean restaurant called Massawa, founded by a burned-out freedom fighter. For around two years of that restaurant's two decades on the Haight, they did brunch as well as dinner. We loved this brunch which included foods you'd never see anywhere else in San Francisco, like kecha fitfit. However, the breakfast dish we loved the most wasn't any of their more traditional Ethiopean breakfast foods: it was their romano bean scramble.

Since we left San Francisco and Massawa left the Haight, I've reverse-engineered the scramble. Every year, when we collect our first harvest of romano beans in the summer, it's the first thing I make with them. You can make it too; it's quite delicious for such a simple breakfast dish.

romano bean scramble

• 3 Tbs clarified butter or ghee (subs. vegetable oil with a little butter)
• 1/2 to 3/4 pound romano beans
• 6 eggs
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/2 to 1 tsp berbere spice mix (subs. chili powder)
• 1/2 tsp sweet paprika
• salt

Crack the eggs into a bowl and beat them with a pinch of salt. Stem the beans, and then cut them into 1 inch pieces. Peel and mince the garlic cloves.

Heat the butter/ghee in a large nonstick frying pan. Fry the beans with the minced garlic over medium heat for a minute. Cover for 3 minutes to allow them to steam. Uncover, stir, and fry until all moisture is gone and some of the beans have browned in spots. Check one for tenderness.

Add the berbere and paprika to the beans, using more berbere is you like things spicy, and fry for around 30 seconds, stirring. Turn up the heat to high and pour in the eggs, and keep stirring to coat the beans and scramble the eggs. Turn off the heat and serve as soon as the curds are set.

Add salt to taste; serve with toast.

Note: substituting string beans for the romano beans does not work in this recipe. The taste and texture are too different.

Another recipe from my archives, just in time for this year's international avocado shortage!

Eggs Benedict, or "Benedicts", or "Bennies", in their many variations, are quite popular restaurant brunch items in California. This is probably because they fall into that class of food which is easy for a restaurant to make, but both annoying and too decadent to make at home. Today, you can order dozens of different "benedicts" which none of the various Benedict families would recognize, including Florentine (sauteed spinach), Cajun (chile-cream sauce and bacon), New York (smoked salmon and tomato), and the Northwestern paragon, the Dungeness Crab Cake Benedict.

This "benedict" aims to be quintessentially California, simple and easy to make at home, and comparatively healthful. The secret is in the organic free-range extra virgin heirloom handmade ingredients. Hence I christen it the "Cal-Bennie". Recipe follows ...

Cal-Bennie

per person:

• 1 sourdough English muffin (preferably handmade from organic flour in a worker-owned cooperative bakery like Arizmendi)
• 1/2 to 1 ripe avocado, depending on size (preferably an organic California Haas avocado)
• 2 eggs (free-range, locally farmed)
• 2 tbs chopped cilantro (organic, but you saw that coming, didn't you?)
• Water and white vinegar or lemon juice
• Salt & black pepper (hand-harvested sea salt and fresh ground organic three-pepper mix, of course)
• Optional: 1oz grated or crumbled parmigiano, feta, or cotija cheese.

Fill a wide saucepan or deep frying pan mostly full of water and bring it to a simmer. Add a couple tablespoons of vinegar or lemon juice to make it slightly acid (this helps the poached eggs set)

While you're waiting for the water to boil, split and toast the english muffins. Pit and peel the avocados. On each 1/2 muffin, mash 1/4 to 1/2 avocado with a fork; you should use enough to make a nice 1/4" thick layer of mashed avocado. Salt lightly.

Poach the eggs until set but with runny yolks.

Drain and carefully place one poached egg on each muffin. Sprinkle the chopped cilantro, some salt & pepper over the top, and cheese, if using. Serve.

Accompany with organic heirloom diced potatoes fried in extra virgin olive oil and/or organic free range naturally cured bacon. Also, it helps to give each diner a steak knife so that they can slice the bennie easily.

Note: this is probably still good made from regular supermarket ingredients. I wouldn't know.

I know, more brunch food, right? What can I say, I love brunch. This dish aims to take advantage of ripe summer tomatoes. Ideally, use some interesting heirloom tomatoes for this, like green zebras, Cherokee purples, Early Girls, or San Marzanos. Don't make it with off-season supermarket tomatoes, you'll regret it.

This is also a good "impress the company" brunch dish, because it's attractive and looks elegant while actually being quite easy to make. You could even hold it for an hour and give it a very quick zap in the microwave before serving, nobody would know.

This recipe was inspired by a recipe in Recipes from an Italian Summer.

caprese omelette tramezzino

6 eggs
2-4 ripe tomatoes, around 1 lbs
4 oz semisoft Italian cheese, grated
1/2 cup basil leaves
1/2 cup chopped parsley
1 oz balsamic vinegar
Salt & pepper
Olive oil
3 small bowls, 12" nonstick pan with lid, large serving platter, basting brush.

Mince the basil and parsley together.

Get three small bowls, and beat 2 eggs, 1/3 of the minced herbs, and a pinch of salt in each.

Stem the tomatoes, and slice thin, around 1/8" slices. Separate into two piles, and separate the grated cheese into two piles. Get everything set up next to the stove; when you start cooking the eggs, things go very fast and you'll need everything within reach or you'll overcook them.

Heat up a 12" nonstick pan with a drizzle of olive oil on high heat. When the oil is almost smoking hot, pour in the first bowl of eggs, and swirl until it covers the bottom of the pan. Quickly sprinkle half the cheese on top. Turn heat down to medium, and cover the pan for 30 to 45 seconds. Uncover; at this point, the egg should be barely set on top, maybe a little wet in the middle. Slide out the first layer of eggs onto a large plate or serving platter. Working quickly so that the cheese is still warm and soft, cover with half the tomato slices in a single non-overlapping layer.

Heat the pan back up to high and repeat the same process as with the first layer. When the eggs are cooked, slide this on top of the eggs and tomatoes, being careful to align it. Cover with the 2nd half of the tomatoes.

Heat the pan back up to high and cook the last set of eggs. This layer will be cooked without cheese. When the eggs are just set, flip the egg disk over and slide it on top of the last tomato layer; you want the "brown" side up. Paint this layer lightly with the balsamic vinegar.

Serve by cutting into wedges with a very sharp knife. Serves two as a solo dish for brunch, or up to six people with various brunch sides (fruit, potatoes, toast, etc.).

Notes:

Get a flavorful, semi-soft Italian cheese for this, such as a soft young pecorino, cacciocavallo, fontina, or provalone. Heck, this is a good dish for that wedge of Quadrello di Bufala you've been saving

Those watching their saturated fat intake can instead use two egg whites and one whole egg in place of each pair of eggs. This recipe might even work with fake eggs.

This breakfast dish ... a sort of "spring green benedict", is a good way to enjoy a little asparagus this weekend. I enjoy making up eggs-benedict-type dishes; pretty much anything with a stack of stuff topped by a poached egg kinda works, and some flavor combinations work really well. I think this one does.

The cheese I actually used was a mold-ripened goat/cow cheese blend which we got from some cheesery or another at Goatapalooza at the Ferry Building. It was delightful in this, but a decent brie, camabert, tallegio or similar "gooey, tangy" cheese will work as well.

spring breakfast stack

per person:

2 crumpets
10-20 spears asparagus, thin to medium stalks
1 oz gooey cheese (see above)
2 eggs
fresh-ground pepper, and salt

Trim the asparagus down to 4" to 5". Put a pan of water on to simmer for the asparagus and eggs.

Toast the crumpets, and spread them with the cheese while still warm.

Poach the asparagus in the simmering water using a larger strainer or vegetable steamer, for 2 to 5 minutes depending on how thick it is. You want it to be still firm, but cooked and easily cut. Drain and dry.

Poach the eggs. While the eggs are poaching, arrange the asparagus on top of the crumpets. Top with the poached eggs, salt and pepper.

Serve with breakfast potatoes.

Let's face it, nonstick pans require replacement every few years. No matter how good the pan is, the Teflon coating eventually becomes damaged and then it's just an aluminum pan. For that reason, it never pays to spend too much on a nonstick pan. On the other hand, I want something which will last a little longer and will stand up to my sometimes abusive cooking. Enter Vollrath.

We were introduced to Vollrath nonstick cookware by a huckster at the Alameda County Fair. It's restaurant industry cookware, which is generally a good bet for value-for-dollar, and also for sturdiness. All-Clad is nice and well-made, but let's face it, you're paying a hefty premium for the pretty.

Since we didn't buy it from the huckster (mainly because we had a loooong walk back to the car), I had to go shopping and was immediately confused by the variety of designs and nonstick coatings offered by Vollrath. Fortunately, I found this sales video which explained it for me. TLDR: you want the CeramiGuard II, which is their best coating, since it has ground-up ceramic material in the Teflon to guard against scraping by utensils. That's what "ceramic coating" means; there's no real non-stick ceramic substance, it's just Teflon with ceramic protection.

So I bought a 10" and decided to put it through its paces.

First things first: the pan is certified by the NSF, which means it can be used in a real restaurant kitchen, for what that's worth. Made in the USA, anyway, which counts for more. The other thing I'll say is that this is somewhat roomier and significantly heavier than my old 10" pan. I have no idea why it says 7in on the bottom of the pan, since this is definitely a 10" pan.

The "Cool Handle II" is a pretty solid bar of cast aluminum with a grip of silicone, good up to 450F in the oven. And you don't want to put nonstick in an oven over 450F anyway, since that destroys the Teflon. The handle is solid and easy to grip — and does, in fact, stay cool — and hangs easily on my potrack. However, it's also the only negative for this pan: the handle is long and heavy enough to make the pan a bit "tippy" when empty. That could be more of a problem with the 8" pan.

So what to make to run a nonstick pan through its paces? An omlette of course! I thought about doing a rolled omlette, but the 10" was a bit small for that so I decided to make an American half-moon omlette with mushrooms.

First, I fried up the mushrooms and the shallots. With the brand-new nonstick surface the mushrooms were like skaters on a newly laid ice rink, sliding around at the sightest touch.

This is the pan after the mushrooms. No washing necessary for the eggs.

The eggs sizzled right up. It was interesting poking holes to let the raw egg through to the bottom; the eggs slid around and I ended up using a 2nd spatula to hold them in place.

Now the filling: fried mushrooms and shallots, Emmenthaler cheese, and parsley. I like to put in the filling while there's still some gooey egg on top, so that the entire omlette fuses together.

Fold over and cook for a bit to set the eggs and fuse with the filling. Then flip to make sure the top is nice and brown. Look at that nice, even browning on the eggs; you can see that the cast aluminum of the pan is conducting heat well. I'd been a bit worried about the lack of a "disk" on the bottom of the pan, but clearly it's not needed. Now, will the omlette slide out of the pan without any help from a spatula?

Indeed it will. So, Vollrath nonstick pans: highly recommended.

Oh, and a recipe:

Mushroom and Swiss Cheese Omlette

• 3 large eggs
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 medium shallot, minced
• 4-6oz crimini or white mushrooms, sliced
• 2 Tbs minced parsley
• 2 oz Emmenthaler or similar Swiss cheese, grated.
• olive oil for pan
• salt & pepper for seasoning

Beat the eggs with the 1/4 tsp salt. Let sit.

Drizzle your nonstick pan with a couple teaspoons of olive oil. Turn on medium-high heat and sprinkle the minced shallot into the pan. When the shallots are sizzling, add the sliced mushrooms. Fry until mushrooms are soft and starting to brown, around 7 minutes. Scrape into a bowl and wipe the pan clean.

Drizzle some more olive oil into the pan and turn up high heat. When the pan is very hot (the olive oil will run like water), dump in the eggs. Cook, folding edges and scraping holes to get most of the liquid egg set.

When the eggs are just a bit gooey on top, cover half the egg round with the fillings, including the mushrooms, cheese, and parsley. Fold the other half over the top (this takes practice and a wide, thin spatula). Lower heat to medium, and cook for another 2 minutes. Then flip the omlette and cook on its other side for another 2 minutes.

Slide out of the pan, with whichever side is the most presentable on top. Serves 1 or 2 people, depending on how hungry they are and how many other things there are for breakfast.