Quiche

I toyed with titling this post “Leek, Bacon and Gruyere Tarlet” or something similarly “foodie” but decided I’d stick to what it actually is, which is quiche. I’m not sure if I’ve ever cooked this before; I have a very vague memory of cooking Quiche Lorraine in Home Economics at school but since I’ve managed to successfully block out most of that hideous term (the fact that our “teacher” couldn’t actually cook and bought all her food from the ready-meals aisle of M&S being just one reason) I can’t be sure.

I’ve seen a lot of interesting quiches (or “tarlets”, depending on the establishment) on lunch menus recently. I’ve seen them popping up in magazines and blogs a lot too and Stephen and I actually had a reasonable one from M&S (could I be more hypocritical, given my earlier comment?!) last week so I thought I’d give it a go. Until I realised I didn’t have a quiche dish. My mum has been trying to pass one on to me for months but I keep saying no, citing my lack of cupboard space and dislike of eggs (I’ll come to that later) as valid reasons for my refusal. So, on his way to cricket this morning Stephen took me to what we like to call “the-most-expensive-cooking-equipment-shop-evah”, so I could purchase one (sorry Mum) but they were closed. Unwilling to give up, I accepted Stephen’s less-than-enticing offer to take me to Hammersmith so I could visit T K Maxx.

With Delia Smith’s stern warning that anything other than metal dishes would do ringing in my ears, I searched the baking section for a suitable vessel. There was one lonely looking metal dish that looked like it was going to have to do but it had a strange, raised bottom to it that didn’t appeal. Having decided that today was Quiche Day though I wasn’t really in a position to argue so I took it. It was only on leaving that I realised there was also a Habitat in Hammersmith so I headed there to see if they had metal quiche dishes with more attractive bottoms….they did indeed but they were individual cases which would have been fine for a tarlet but didn’t seem right for an actual quiche. I then spotted a beautiful, brown, stoneware dish for the bargain price of £5. What would Delia say though? Well, Delia’s been saying an awful lot lately about cheating hasn’t she so I thought I’d cheat too.

I’d done a little research into quiche but couldn’t find a recipe that was exactly what I wanted so instead I improvised. I cheated again by using frozen pastry (my hands are too hot for the real thing) but did follow Delia’s advice on baking the pastry blind, then egg-washing and baking for a further five minutes.

I sauteed some leeks (I told you I was obsessed with them didn’t I?) and some bacon and allowed that to cool before spreading the mixture over the base. I then added some pine-nuts that were leftover from the pesto, some grated Gruyere cheese and a mix of 275mls single cream, two eggs and an extra yolk. The quiche was then baked in the oven for 45 minutes.

It looked good but we had to wait until today to find out how it tasted. We did manage to get it out of the non-metallic case too so clearly ignoring Delia’s advice was the best option 🙂