Mom’s Famous Breakfast Sandwich

My mom makes THE best breakfast sandwich (#mymomisthebestcook)!! Every Sunday after church we would stop at the “panaderia” (bakery) and get some freshly made Pan de Agua (Water bread). It similar to Cuban, French,  or Italian bread, has the same ingredients but different ways to bake it. Then we would go home and she would fry some eggs, ham, and sweet plantains and she would make this bundle of deliciousness that would make any Sunday a real Glorious day! Every time we would have friends come over to visit my mom, she would make those for breakfast and they always go crazy over it.

If you don’t access to Water Bread (or Cuban, French, or Italian), you can use really any type of bread you want. The idea is for the bread to be warm but not hard. It is difficult to eat a sandwich when the bread is so hard. On the photo, I used Jewish rye (I LOVE Rye bread) and in the video, I used sourdough bread. But any type of slice bread will work.

You can use any type of cheese you want. Usually, we made it with Cheddar or Gouda, but any cheese that melts will work. You want to give it a kick, add some Pepperjack, Yummmm!!!!

When frying the eggs, the hardness of the yolks is going to be determined by how messy you want your sandwich. The softer the yolk, the messier is going to be, but to me, its more flavorful that way. Sometimes I put a pinch of salt and pepper when frying the eggs, but with the cheese and the ham, it is not really necessary. I don’t use a lot of oil when frying the eggs, most of the times just a thin coat of oil does the trick. I usually put the ham in the same pan I am frying the eggs because really all you want is to warm up the ham. A light browning does it.

You can replace the ham for bacon, prosciutto, salami, mortadella (yummm!!), or any other sliced meat you prefer. To me, ham is the winner!

When making the plantains, you can cheat a little. A lot of grocery stores have sweet plantains in the freezer section, partly cooked. All you have to do is open your container, and fried them in oil. If you want to go more traditional, get some ripe plantains from the produce, peel them, cut them in 1-inch (25 mm) diagonal slices. The more oil, the easier it will be to fry. I don’t like to have oil all over the stove, so I use a little oil and keep a close eye. You want them a pretty brown, not black. Brown means the sugars are caramelizing and they will be outstanding.

I hope you enjoy this sandwich as much as we do! Buen Provecho from my mom and me!!