Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Recipe: Quiche

Another successful venture in the kitchen! Last night's mission: basic quiche. I had grabbed a recipe out of last month's Real Simple magazine, and finally realized that quiche was actually quite simple! (And, a great use for leftover refrigerated pie crusts that I stocked up on for Thanksgiving and never ended up using.) Aside from the cheese that this recipe calls for, the ingredients are pretty cheap, and it filled both NavyGuy and I up without needing anything else for supper.

The recipe can be found here, but I'm going to give my version as well as some notes.


Basic Quiche - Ingredients
- 1 9 inch refrigerated piecrust (any brand works; they usually come two in a box so just freeze the other one for later use)
- 2 medium onions, chopped (I used one big one and it seemed to be enough)
- 1 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped (I didn't measure this either, just chopped up a bunch and kept adding until the mixture looked "green" enough)
- 4 large eggs
- 3/4 cup half-and-half (I used fat-free)
- 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg (totally forgot to buy this, so I substituted "one shake" of pumpkin pie seasoning - hey it has nutmeg in it! no complaints from anyone)
- 8 oz. , approx. 2 cups, Gruyere, grated (fancy cheese is expensive! from my online search, I found you could substitute Jarlsberg, Emmantaler, or plain old Swiss. I used Jarlsberg which was still more than I'm used to paying for Kraft cheese slices, but just use what you can find at the store - it's not going to make that much of a difference in terms of taste unless you're a cheese snob)
- salt and pepper
- oil to cook the onions

Directions
1. Heat oven to 375. Fit the piecrust into a 9-inch pie plate. Place on a baking sheet. (You totally don't need one of the fancy quiche/tart pans like is in the photo above - I used a regular pie pan, or you could probably even get away with a round cake pan. I sprayed the pan with Pam so the crust wouldn't stick.)

2. Cook the onions in oil over medium-low heat in a skillet, with a little salt and pepper thrown in. Stir occasionally for 5-7 minutes until onion is soft. (My onions were in the pan for a good 15 minutes because it took me longer to grate the cheese than expected. No harm, no foul.) Stir in the parsley.

3. In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, half-and-half, nutmeg, and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Stir in the onion/parsley mixture, and the grated cheese.

4. Pour the egg mixture into the crust. Bake until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean, 35-40 minutes. (Mine needed 40 minutes.) Let sit for 5 minutes before serving.

It was awesome - this is now a go-to recipe for me if I need a nice brunch item, or just a quick dinner. Now that I know better how to grate cheese, I could probably do all the prep in less than 20 minutes. You can also jazz it up by adding other vegetables (asparagus, spinach, mushrooms) or meat (diced ham) - it's basically a fancier omlete, so I assume anything that works in an omlete, can probably be added to a quiche!

Let me know if you try it out or have any other variations or tips for this recipe!

2 comments:

Anonymous,  January 13, 2009 at 5:00 PM  

Yeah! More recipes! Keep 'em coming. I'm trying out some new fancy meals from Rachel Ray and I'll be sure to pass on the keepers.

TWP

historygirlie January 13, 2009 at 7:17 PM  

Spinach is awesome in a quiche, especially with swiss cheese. Chop it up like parsley. Also, try bacon and cheddar.....it's awesome.

I'm so proud of your cooking habits....i could almost tear up.....maybe some day you'll enter the Military County Fair someday!!! ;)

Blog Widget by LinkWithin

Blog Archive

  © Blogger templates The Professional Template by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP