Monday, February 22, 2010

Quiche Cliche.

So I'm pretty sure in some cultures, when a woman reaches a certain mature age, such as when convenient store clerks might justifiably start calling her ma'am, she celebrates this longevity by learning to cook brunch foods and party dips.

I woke up yesterday with a craving for breakfast, but not enough time to get any before work. So the eggs craving stayed with me all day. First I thought I wanted a frittata, but when I started searching recipes I realized I didn't want potatoes and eggs, I wanted cream and nutmeg and eggs. I talked Buddy into letting me use his oven in exchange for dinner. We bought the requisite bottles of wine needed anytime Buddy and I cook anything together, and as per tradition didn't actually start cooking till about 9pm.

I've never made a quiche before. In my head it falls squarely in the realm of spinach dip and layered bean casseroles. Which is to say foods that reached their peak in the 70s. I also feel like I should have had some awesome hand glazed stoneware to make it in.



Those aren't potatoes floating around in there. It's chunks of cheese. And flecks of nutmeg. I mean seriously, the apartment smelled so good with the shallots and the nutmeg cooking away.
I definitely wasn't going to fuck with a crust, so I made a "crustless quiche" which worked out really well, I don't see why anyone would need a crust. I didn't really follow a recipe, since this is basically egg pie you can put anything in. So I added Canadian bacon, shallots, and fontina cheese. Let me just say, fontina cheese is now one of my favorite cheeses. It melted so well, so smoothly. I may never use mozzerrella again. Which is a lie, but also sort of the truth.



I really liked it last night, but I liked it even more this morning. I'm not the worlds biggest fan of eggs, but the custard was really light and smooth. I may have discovered my new favorite lunch food. Also, what's cheaper than eggs? And yes, I know that is a shitload of tomatoes on that plate. I happen to like cherry tomatoes a lot. What of it?



Crustless Quiche

ingredients
1/2 cup panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup parmesan
5 large eggs
2 cups heavy cream
1 tbsp nutmeg
1 tbsp pepper
However much filling you want. I used 8 slices Canadian bacon diced, a very large chunk of fontina cheese diced, and 3 shallots diced.
1 tbsp butter

Preheat the oven to 425.
Butter a non-stick baking pan, preferably a 9 inch pie pan or quiche pan
Mix together the panko and parmesan. Layer the bottom of the pan with it.
In a stovetop pan, fry the bacon, and then add the shallots. Cook slowly until slightly carmelized.
Spoon the bacon and shallots into the pie pan. Do not eat the bacon.
Layer the diced cheese on top of that.
Then whisk together the eggs, cream, nutmeg and pepper. Pour that on top of everything else.
Very carefully place in the oven, taking care to not step on cats or let the refrigerator door hit you in the elbow as you're walking past and someone else is getting wine.
Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until set. You may want to cover with foil for the last ten minutes, depending on how browned it gets.
Let cool for at least an hour.



We also tried making these lime-coconut bar cookies, but we forget to put butter in the crumble on the bottom (10:30pm perhaps being the wrong time to make cookies, one bottle deep). So what we got was a cookie with two very yummy top layers, and one very dry oat/flour flavored crust.

I'll try them again sometime and let you know. Turns out sweetened condensed milk is totally the ingredient of 2010.

I'm so old.

6 comments:

  1. Hey quiches are Awesome!

    or crap maybe I'm just old too.

    either way I think I'll make the wifey make this sometime

    looked tasty

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  2. Or you could, you know, make it for her. And pretend it was really hard.

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  3. fritattas are my favorite egg dish, yours made me want o go bake one, but it is late and I am tired, so maybe tomorrow.

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  4. I haven't had a quiche in ages (and I'm not sure I've ever cooked one) but those chunks of cheese and the heavy browning might have sold me on giving them another chance.

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  5. Browned cheese is like...a reason to live.

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  6. Ok so I figured out the difference between the frittata and the quiche, besides the whole no crust thing. A fritata is made in a frying pan and started on the stove then finished in the oven. You can add whatever filling you want. A quiche is wholly baked in the oven.

    ReplyDelete

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