A Veggie Breakfast for Each Day of the Week _ The Veggie _ NYT Cooking.

Happy New Year. I'm Tanya, an editor at New York Times Cooking, and this is The Veggie. It's 2026. It's resolution time. New year, new you, new me. I think you probably have some goals, and I think someone's calling the Veggie hotline. Hello? I simply want to eat more veggie-based, tasty, and filling meals this year. I mean look, we all need to eat more vegetables, but the answer is not just eating a bunch of salads. The answer is eating more vegetables at breakfast. A veggie breakfast might not be entirely obvious, but it's a lot easier than you think, and I'm going to show you a handful of ways to eat vegetables for every day of the week. That's right, seven breakfasts with a lot of vegetables. Every day demands a different style of breakfast because you will wake up in a different mood every day. It's Sunday night, you just watched some prestige HBO show and you have 30 minutes to kind of get your week started by meal prepping a breakfast. This is Ali Slagle's New Mexico breakfast burrito swapping in Ali Slagle's tofu scramble for the eggs. I think the kind of Coated meal breakfast is a breakfast burrito because you can make the components in batches and then you can also batch the burritos themselves. This is just like a vehicle for all of your vegetable dreams. Let's do this. I'm such a frozen hash browns kind of girl. You basically can have french fries for breakfast. I'm actually not timing this. I like my hash browns real crispy, so I might also take this a little bit slightly longer. The other thing about making crispy hash browns is you shouldn't keep touching them. Do your thing. On a Sunday night, have some wine, make some hash browns, watch your show. All right, is this it? Yeah, okay, see, now we're burning. It's okay though. Nothing in life can be perfect, not even your hash browns. So now we're going to just take the hash browns and we're going to put them in a line on the tortilla. We're going to set these aside because they don't need to be hot right now because you're making them ahead because it's Sunday. And we're going to make some tofu. So We are putting tofu scramble instead of eggs into these burritos because when I was thinking about the overall week, I don't want to lean too heavily on eggs. I love an egg. The American breakfast tends to lean a bit egg heavy, so I wanted to provide some instances of either swaps or just completely eggless breakfasts for our vegan friends. She writes that if time allows, you should press the tofu to try to extract as much water as possible. Again, it's Sunday night, so time allows. So now the paper towel is... Like completely soaked with all the moisture from the tofu. We've taken just one block of tofu and cut it kind of crosswise. So we're just going to take the cumin and the turmeric and the soy sauce and then a little bit of water to dilute things. If you cook with turmeric a lot, you already know this. If you haven't before, like even just touching it will dye the tips of your fingers like a really beautiful marigold color. And that's what it's going to do to the tofu. So we'll get like a really nice... Yellowy color. Once you see the water kind of dancing on the skillet like that, that's how you know it's ready for oil. And then we're just gonna season this quickly with salt and pepper. Oil, smoky, very hot. I'm gonna go ahead and just... So now I'm just gonna kind of break this up. And we add the scallions. It looks like scrambled eggs. It tastes just like a kind of neutrally savory tofu. In the same way that you're kind of like, what does an egg taste like? And then I like the freshness that the scallion provides. Let's make a burrito, but we're just going to put like a little bit of cheese over the potatoes. I'm going to do one white and one yellow because I can. The thing about burritos is you don't want to over stuff them. We're just going to kind of... That one's going to be a little thick. We're going to see how these roll up. We've got some salsas for serving but then we just have hatch green chilies. I like a lot. Personally I want lots of peppers. We're gonna see if I went to the Chipotle school of rolling a burrito. A note, something that makes rolling a burrito easier is having slightly warm tortillas. Of course I'm gonna do this on camera and it's gonna look like sh**. You just have to go with it. Oops see we got a rip. We're gonna do this again. The other one's gonna be better. So the parchment is so that you can reheat these easily. So I'm gonna just use the parchment in the same way that I wrapped the burrito where I'm kind of tucking the sides. This actually is kind of ugly. I didn't do a good job on this one. Like a pancake, the first burrito is not gonna be the best one. But that second burrito, okay, okay, okay. Tucking on the sides. Oh my God, we did it. No rip, wow, look at her, gorgeous. This is my hero burrito. And you're ready to rock. It's Monday morning, we're not cooking. You're eating a burrito from yesterday. Grab one out of the freezer, pop it in the microwave. You're either a green salsa girl or a red salsa girl. The tofu's giving egg. The potatoes are nice and crispy. Got a little bit of cheese. The onion comes through. The chili is so nice. Wow, I love that that worked. Why wouldn't it? Now it's Tuesday. Maybe you're... Game to do a little cooking, giant air quotes cooking. We're doing assembly, right? Tuesday's kind of a drag. You're really far from the weekend. I'm gonna give you two options for a really quick assembly breakfast that you can either make morning of, or there is one small prep element if you wanna do it the night before. This is a sexy, more adult parfait, if you ask me. And we're gonna use cottage cheese, which very in vogue right now, packed with protein. I know this is not a vegetable, just stay with me. But we have a fruit that leans vegetable. Ali's recipe is a strawberry topping. Monday night, you get home from work, you literally just toss strawberries and the seasonings together. A little red wine vinegar and a little bit of honey. It really is that kind of like sweet and savory combination that I think is kind of the best way to go about breakfast. Generous pinch of salt. I like a lot of black pepper. You want to make sure that the honey is really evenly distributed. Now I'm going to show you my version of this. Instead of red wine vinegar, we're going to do balsamic. And instead of honey, we're going to do olive oil. And it's like a much more savory interpretation, but again, same framework. I'm going to reserve a little bit of olive oil just to drizzle over the cottage cheese because I like to do that. I just do a splash of balsamic. You don't need too much. And also, if you want to reserve a little bit of fresh basil to put over top, you could do that, too. You can do that on a Tuesday morning. We're done. That's it. And now we're going to just make two versions of a cottage cheese bowl, classic style, a la Ali, cottage cheese number two. And then I'm going to just add a little bit more basil and a final drizzle of olive oil. Ali's version, Tanya's version. I love what the vinegar and the pepper adds to the strawberry. The pistachio also adds a more savory quality. I also know that this Ali topping would be just as good on a bowl of yogurt if you are not a cottage cheese person. I know what this tastes like. Personally, if I'm having cottage cheese, I want it to go cheesy and savory. It's a caprese that you can feel good about. You don't feel like you're eating 16 slices of mozzarella, even though there's nothing wrong with that. That's Tuesday. Happy Wednesday, happy hump day. We're making a smoothie because this is maybe my least favorite day of the week. You're so close and yet you're still so far and I don't wanna bother with breakfast too much. This is the shortcut recipe of the week. You can cram as many greens as you like. So we have a non-dairy milk, agave, a Popeye's endorsed amount of spinach, and then we have a few ribs of kale. I'm just ripping the leaves off of the ribs. Some people are very anti-banana and smoothie because every smoothie with a banana in it becomes a banana smoothie. But smartly in this recipe, which Ali Slagle adapted from a smoothie shop, this does a good job of masking the banana flavor with not only the agave, but a little bit of ginger and then also some vanilla extract. Beautiful color. And now we're going to add our ice and our vanilla extract one more time. This is maybe the most virtuous looking breakfast of all. Absolutely. Yeah, I could chug this and eat it with a burrito. It's Thursday. So we've had a couple of quick weekday recipes. And my Thursday ethos is weekends almost here. Maybe the week is a little slower for you. I wanted one fun weekday egg moment. If you got 30 minutes, we're making an egg in a hole with asparagus. You're probably wondering, Tanya, What is an egg in a hole with asparagus? It is exactly what it sounds like. This is a Melissa Clark recipe, and she loves asparagus. So if you are not an asparagus person, make green beans, snap peas, broccolini, broccoli rabe, vegetable for breakfast. Similar to a French toast, we are going to dredge some nice sourdough bread in a batter of milk and eggs. Got some butter. The more you know. Can't spell the veggie without egg. People are going to not like that one. Whoa, beautiful yolk. I'm really outing myself as like a big pepper head on this video. We're going to let these rest for just two minutes and then we're just prepping our asparagus. So we're just going to put the asparagus on the sheet pan. We want to make sure that there's room for the bread on one side. I'm gonna go with half the scallions, some thyme, some salt and pepper, and just a little drizzle of olive oil. Then we're gonna toss. Just make sure that this gets nicely soaked on both sides and absorbing as much of the liquid as possible. Let's punch some holes. So you want You want them to be equally spaced. Amazing, beautiful, stellar. Doesn't this kind of look like Wall-E? Wall-E! You want these to go on the sheet pan, too, because they can be little hats. And then we're gonna put this in the oven for 10 minutes at 425. We're gonna check on our asparagus, flip our bread, crack our eggs. Little bit of Parmesan over the eggs. Back in, five to seven minutes. You jiggle the pan a little bit, you see the eggs are nicely set. We have no wiggly white. This looks gorgeous. The parmesan and the egg soak really gets a nice crust on the bread. I like mine a little over medium. And then we have these like gorgeous little bread hats. One of our producers said looks like scallops and I can't disagree. Oh, Oh, ooh. see this is exactly how I like my egg cooked. It's like kind of jammy, but not like super runny. And the parmesan on the egg in a hole as kind of like a savory French toast is genius. You did it, it's Friday. For our Friday breakfast. My thinking was maybe you're able to work from home or maybe you have a little extra time, and what that is, cheese grits. This recipe, which comes from Sarah Copeland, tops the grits with black beans and avocado and radishes. We are doing a combination of vegetable broth and milk. If you are new to cooking with grits, there's a lot of variety. We are using a coarser ground yellow grits today. So we're adding some vegetable broth, milk, teaspoon of salt, and then we're going to add our grits. Just gonna mix this up before I turn the heat on. Similar to a risotto or a polenta, this requires a little bit more stirring over time. You kind of wanna stir frequently for 20 to 25 minutes. While the grits are going, we're gonna make our beans. This is a very simple, saucy black bean. What makes it saucy, you ask? We're adding broth and a little bit of cayenne for a kick. You could do a Cuban-style black bean, which I am partial to, with some garlic and onions and oregano. Really kind of whatever floats your boat. We got vegetable broth. We got black beans and we have ground cayenne. We're gonna cook these over low until they're saucy. Okay these have been going for 20-ish minutes and now we're at a stage where we can add some butter and some cheese. Give this all a stir until the butter is melted and the cheese is well incorporated. Say when. Whole time. We have a handful of toppings. We have avocado, radish, scallion, a little bit more manchego cheese. But you could really top a bowl of grits and beans with whatever you like. Sautéed spinach I think would be really nice, or sautéed kale, or collard greens, or Swiss chard. Shall we? We're gonna do some grits. Saucy black beans and sliced avocado. I like a lot of scallions. And just a little bit of cheese. Again, the art of the perfect bite. Gotta have a little bit of everything. The beans are nice and smoky. The grits are so cheesy. Having a cheese grit on a Friday feels very, like, congratulations. You made it to the weekend. More beans for breakfast, but you should. It's Saturday. When I am thinking about a Saturday breakfast, I am actually thinking that is the perfect day for brunch and not Sunday. Sunday, I get scared. Saturday feels a little bit more celebratory. And so invite some friends over, make a big shakshuka. We're going to make a vibrant green shakshuka, which is vegetable packed. This is also our big egg moment beyond the egg in a hole. Onions go in. We're not going for necessarily like a Hard caramelized onion here. And we're gonna cook this for about five minutes and then we're gonna add in the garlic. After the onions and garlic are nice and soft, we're gonna add the chard stems first. They will take a little longer to cook than the leaves will. And despite this being kind of our designated weekend recipe, I picked this for Saturday mostly because I think it's striking and great for entertaining and obviously a much larger batch so if you're having friends over or cooking for family it's a great option. Okay so now we're gonna add the chard leaves and batches just until they wilt slightly and we can add more to the pot but you don't want to kind of crowd it too much. That is a lot of chard. So now you're making your little egg holes. For shakshuka, you want to make as many holes as you have eggs. So for this recipe, we're going to make eight. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Wow, I can't count. Oh, there's definitely a shell in that one. Oops. I wish I was one of those people who could crack an egg with one hand, but oh. All right, so now we just want to cover these until the whites are set. Seven to nine minutes. Okay, it's been about seven minutes, so let's check on our... Eggs which are looking gorgeous. We've got a couple that have set a little bit more than the others because I think this is just a slightly uneven burner but that's okay. Salt. And then we have another magnificent toppings bar situation. And you can eat this with tortillas, or you could eat it with some nice sourdough or a baguette. So let's dress our pan as if we are serving to a house full of guests. Trying to make it pretty, and I'm not doing a good job. Lots of jalapenos. Kind of like dressing a pizza. A lot of beautifully cut limes and cilantro. It's Saturday! Live from New York. It's Saturday morning! Okay, that looks good. We have a nice, whoa! Yolky center. Again, I keep making bites for Goliath here. Look at that. You get the nice warm cooked through greens that are a little saucy, but also creamy. The eggs are perfectly cooked and the toppings to me are the real pièce de résistance. I love a lot of fresh cilantro. What's not to love? And genuinely Only for our Saturday recipe, it still is very quick. Two thumbs up. Happy Sunday. We did it. We made it to the end of the week or the beginning of the week, depending on who you're asking. Sunday is when the scaries hit, big time. We are making a sweet potato and tofu hash. While this is a recipe that takes a little bit of time, that time is entirely what it takes to roast in the oven. Not to come too full circle, but you could prep the components of this hash, eat it on Sunday and have whatever leftovers wrapped up in, you guessed it, a burrito. I have been making a variation of this when I graduated from college and moved into my first apartment with seven roommates. And I had to make quick use of my time in the kitchen, and so I got really comfortable making sweet potato hash. It really was one of the first things I felt comfortable cooking for myself. Let me show you how it's done. We are going to combine the onions, the red bell pepper, and some olive oil, and we're just gonna give this a toss. Put this on the sheet tray. I am just flattening this out into a nice single even layer so that everything cooks really evenly. You could also make a hash on the stovetop, which is kind of the way that I was doing it when I was in college, and then I'm gonna plop this guy. And in that same bowl, so that we don't mess up so many dishes, we go sweet potatoes. We've got some cubed extra-firm tofu. And this tofu's been patted dry. But to make sure that both the tofu and the sweet potato get nicely crisp, we also have a little bit of cornstarch. And then we have some chili powder and some salt and the rest of the olive oil. And then we're going to give this a nice toss until everything is coated in both oil and cornstarch. I like to season mine with a little bit of cumin sometimes or some coriander. My hands are so small. Too much crowding so that things brown easily. And then this is gonna go in the oven and roast for about 30 minutes. So while that's cooking, we're gonna make some quick pickled onions to put over top. This is a very simple iteration. We're just gonna do salt, vinegar, chili powder. It's that easy, folks. We're gonna need a bigger boat. Man down. Come on, toss. You could leave them on the counter, set them in the fridge while the hash finishes roasting. Now I'm going to just kind of toss them all together. Let's try some beautiful hash. It's nice and fiery, tangy from the pickled onions. You get pops of sweetness, obviously, from the sweet potato. I would eat it kind of just like this. I don't think it needs anything else, but if you had leftovers, roll those puppies up into burritos. They said it couldn't be done. They didn't say that. We have before us our seven days of veggie-forward vegetarian breakfasts that don't lean too heavily on eggs, that incorporate a variety of different vegetables, and that suit every day of the week. With this roadmap, I think you can effectively incorporate vegetables into the most important meal of the day, and this is but a template. If that is a thing that you are hoping to do in the new year, you know where to find these recipes. They're in the veggie newsletter, and of course, on New York Times Cooking. And if you already know how to incorporate veggies into your breakfast, but you have other vegetarian cooking questions, I want to hear from you. Leave me a voice memo in the email below, and I might just answer the call. 1-800-VEGGIE