Brussels Sprout Casserole

Try this recipe to turn around the Brussels sprouts hater in your household. Roasting the sprouts on a preheated sheet pan ensure that they get cooked through and dark and delicious on the outside. Bringing bacon and cream to the party ensures a lovable dish. Being able to make most of this dish ahead makes it great for avoiding the oven-contention on holidays, though you could certainly make it all at one go.

• Ingredients
• Instructions

Ingredients

Start - Sprouts

• 2 pounds Brussel's sprouts
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted
• 2 tablespoons water
• 2 tsp kosher salt
• 3 or 4 grinds of pepper

Casserolify - Bacon, Crumbs and Cheese

• 1 cup coarse fresh breadcrumbs
• 6 slices bacon, fried until crisp, drained and crumbled; drippings reserved separately from bacon
• 1/4 cup finely shredded gruyere

Finish - Cream and Bake

• 1 1/4 cups whipping cream

Instructions

Start - Sprouts

1. Adjust oven racks to middle- and upper-middle positions.
2. Put 2 half sheet pans (baking sheets) in the oven.
3. Turn the oven on to 500 ° F. Leave those sheets in!
4. Trim sprouts; remove stems and cut all but smaller ones (smaller than 1.5 inches) in half.
5. Melt the butter. Add the water to it.
6. Add salt and pepper to butter.
7. Drizzle butter over sprouts and stir to distribute.
8. When oven is done preheating, remove sheets and quickly place sprouts cut side down on sheets.
9. Cover sheets tightly with foil and return to oven.
10. Bake at 500 ° F for 10 minutes.
11. Remove foil.
12. Bake for another 8 minutes and then remove sheets to cool. (Sprouts should be tender when forked, and crisp on the outside.)

Casserolify - Bacon, Crumbs and Cheese

13. Cook bacon on stove top in its own grease. Reserve the bacon grease.
14. When bacon is cool, crumble it.
15. Mix 1 tablespoon bacon grease into bread crumbs.
16. Mix cheese into crumbs.
17. Put sprouts into a 9" by 13" casserole dish.
18. Top sprouts with bacon crumbles.

At this point, you can stop and refrigerate the casserole dish and breadcrumbs separately. The final assembly and baking will take about 20 minutes.

Finish - Cream and Bake

19. Take sprouts and crumbs out of refrigerate and let them warm up for 20-30 minutes.
20. Preheat oven to 425 ° F.
21. Add cream to bacon.
22. Bake sprouts for about 5 - 7 minutes; cream should thicken.
23. Sprinkle crumbs over sprouts.
24. Set oven to broil and move a rack to 6 inches under broiler.
25. Broil sprouts for about 4 minutes; but keep an eye on it to avoid burning crust.
26. Serve immediately, or keep warm to serve.