Basic Sausage Breakfast Strata (6 servings) 1 loaf day-old Italian or French bread 1 pound pork or turkey bulk breakfast sausage - mild or spicy 1 small onion - chopped 1 medium green or red bell pepper - chopped 4 large eggs 1 and 3/4 cups milk salt and pepper - to taste 1 and 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar or Pepper Jack cheese (or a combination) Prepare an 7x11-inch baking dish by spraying generously with cooking spray or coating with softened butter. In a skillet or frying pan, cook and crumble the sausage for 5 minutes. Add the chopped onion and bell pepper. Cook 5 to 7 minutes more until the vegetables are softened and the sausage is no longer pink. Remove from heat. In a medium mixing bowl, beat the eggs and milk together. Season with a pinch of salt and touch of freshly ground black pepper. Cut the bread into 1/2-inch slices. Layer 1/3 of bread in the pan. Trim (or carefully rip) the slices as needed so the layer of bread fits the dimensions of the pan. Sprinkle 1/2 of the sausage and 1/2 cup of the cheese over the bread. Continue layering with 1/3 of the bread, the rest of the sausage and another 1/2 cup cheese. Add a final layer of bread and then slowly pour the egg and milk mixture over everything. Wait 1 minute for the liquid to sink down and then sprinkle on the remaining cheese. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or up to 12 hours if making the night before. When ready to cook: Bake in a 350 degree oven for 50 minutes to an hour. You can tell that it's done when a toothpick instead in the center comes out dry. Cooking Notes: Try replacing the green pepper with other vegetables like chopped mushrooms or corn kernels. They require less cooking, so just add them 3 minutes before the sausage is done frying. You can replace the sausage with bacon if desired. Just cook and crumble the bacon before adding it to the dish. A strata is a series of layers (or stratum). In this case, the layers consists of delicious breakfast sausage, quality bread, cheese and vegetables. This is a good recipe to experiment with to fit your personal tastes. Mr Breakfast would like to thank Mr Breakfast for this recipe. Recipe number 3160. Submitted 1/19/2013.