Day 18 - Quiche!

My family has been clamoring for a Quiche since I started this little adventure.  I've been resisting, as making a Quiche is a fairly time intensive process, especially if you are making the pie shell from scratch.  The dough has to sit, and the cook time for the pie is about an hour.  But it is the weekend, so I decided to suck it up and put together a squash Quiche.


Once upon a time, I put a fair amount of time into the kitchen of a restaurant in Boston.  I had just graduated college and found a job at a Faniuel Hall place called Serendipity III.  The Jon Cusak movie was about the New York (original location) restaurant of the same name..  The owners had expanded to Boston and Wesport CT.  After a while, both Boston and Westport closed.  Now there are Serendipity III locations in Florida, Las Vegas and Georgetown.  Two of the three original owners are gone, but Steven Bruce is still here.


The Quiche that Calvin Holt taught me how to make is what I still make today.  So, thank you Calvin and Steven for teaching me this excellent Quiche recipe.  This is by no means low calorie, but it is absolutely delicious.


Squash Quiche


For the dough:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1 cup unsalted butter, chilled, and cut into 1 inch pieces
1/4 to 1/2 cup ice water


For the Pie:
8 oz. Sour Cream
9 Eggs
1/2 cup Milk
1 1/2 cup grated smoked mozzarella
1 medium onion sliced thinly
1 zucchini cut into quarters then sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1 yellow zucchini cut into quarters then sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1/4 cup fresh basil coarsely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 T Olive Oil
1T Butter
freshly grated pepper


Make sure that your butter is very, very cold.  It is even ok to cut the butter and stick it in the freezer for a few minutes prior to starting.    In a food processor, mix the flour and the salt.  Add the butter, pulsing the mix just until the dough starts to take on the texture of a course meal.  Be careful not to over process the dough.  Once the butter in incorporated, turn the dough into a large bowl.  Slowly add the ice water, mixing with your hands.  Add only enough water so that the dough just comes together.  Gather the dough together into a ball.  Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.  Longer is OK.


While the dough is resting, melt the butter.  Once the butter is melted, add the olive oil.  When the oil is hot, add the onion, and cook until the onion just begins to brown. Add the squash and cook until the squash starts to brown.  Add the garlic and cook for a minute or two longer.  Add the basil, keep the vegetable mix on the heat just until the basil wilts.  Take off of the heat and set aside.  This is a good time to preheat your oven to 375 degrees.


To make the custard, always start with the heaviest ingredients and add each lighter ingredient.  If you do not work in this direction, you will end up with a lumpy custard that will not cook well.  Put the sour cream in a large bowl.  Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing a little between the addition of each egg.  Once the eggs and sour cream are mixed together very well, add the milk.  If the custard feels too heavy, add a little more milk.  Grate in some black pepper and set aside.


Now that the pie dough has been sitting for at least 30 minutes, take it out of the fridge, and roll it out so  that it is large enough to fit into your pie pan, and is not more than 1/4 inch thick.  Place the dough into your pie pan, press the dough into the pan so that it fits well.  Take a fork and prick the dough all over.  Put the dough in the oven to cook for a 5 to 6 minutes.  You want it to be a little cooked, but not so much that it burns during the rest of the cooking time.


Once the dough has pre-cooked, you are ready to start assembling the Quiche.  I always cook pies with the pie pan on a cookie sheet.  There is nothing worse that a pie that overflows the pie pan, spilling filling on the inside of the oven.  Things start to smoke, and there is almost nothing you can do except let it burn.  So, grab a cookie sheet, put your pie pan on it, and start adding to the pie pan.


Add the vegetables and spread them evenly over the inside of the pie.  Do the same with the grated cheese. Slowly pour the egg mixture into the pan so that the egg fills in all of the openings in the filling.  Get it as close to the rim of the pie as you can.


Put the Quiche on the middle rack of your oven and cook it for 50 minutes.  Check the pie after 50 minutes by giving it a light shake.  If it is still jiggley, cook it for an additional 10 minutes.  Make sure it doesn't get too dark brown.


Serve the pie with a salad (I did, and I'll post that recipe later in the week)


Reviews:  8 year old said "is there squash in this?"  There was, and she ate around it.  I think we snuck a few pieces into her.  The 15 year old liked it.  Becca loved it.  The 18 year old just came back from camp.  She declared "the best thing about camp was that I didn't have to eat squash".  She ate it, and I think she actually liked it.


Enjoy!