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Actually, it didn’t. This quiche had no fucking initiative.

Work is busy this week and Brian is out of town at a conference for work*, and that usually adds up to one thing: cereal for dinner every night. On top of that, part of me doesn’t want to move on to a new post because the feedback from the last one was so lovely and it sparked memories for so many of you; I especially appreciated the universal disdain for pink kitchenware. But eventually you have to move on from the schmaltzy shit and make a damn quiche.

Okay, I’m not quite ready to move on, so this’ll be a short one.

*In New Orleans. And I happen to know that at this exact moment, he’s out at a concert at the House of Blues. I ask you, what kind of “conference” is this? Your tax dollars at work, people.

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Vegetables in a pan. There you go.

There’s no cereal in the house right now, but there is a lot of leftover kielbasa from this weekend’s inauguration of the grill. Needless to say, after 2 days my body was sending my text messages asking for vegetable matter (I might have taken leftover kielbasa for lunch one day, too). I had some asparagus and mushrooms in the fridge, and found half a log of herb goat cheese. I wasn’t totally sure if the goat cheese was still good because I couldn’t remember when or for what I’d bought it, and even fresh goat cheese tastes, you know, goat-y. Musty. I decided to walk on the wild side and use it.

In the last post, I extolled the virtues of frozen fruit. Today, I tout the joy of frozen pie crust. If you’re industrious, you can make a few homemade crusts and freeze ’em; if you’re lazy, you can buy some. Either way, they go right from freezer to oven and allow you to make spur-of-the-moment quiche.

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The three stages of quiche. You know what’s really hard to make photogenic? Uncooked quiche. I bet you guessed that one.

I sauteed the veggies up in some good butter and scattered a layer of the veg across my frozen pie crust. I considered mixing the goat cheese into the custard, but decided to crumble it across the veg. I topped the whole thing off with a simple custard and managed to get it in the oven without sloshing too much raw custard on myself or the floor. Thank god for dogs.

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Quiche me, you fool.

Near the end of the cooking time, I turned the broiler on for a few minutes to get a little extra color. I let the quiche sit for 15 or 20 minutes to set up while I watched the first few singers on American Idol. Yes, I must mention American Idol every time I post on a Tuesday night. And even though you all deny watching, I can’t help but notice that my page hits drop dramatically between 8 and 9PM EST on Tuesdays.

I’m just saying.

Anyway, this quiche was satisfactory. You can’t go wrong with a sauteed mushroom, and the goat cheese added a nice tart edge to the creamy custard; in fact, I could have had a more liberal hand with the cheese (there are few times when this is NOT the case). The asparagus got pretty mushy with the 35-minute baking time but took on a deep sweetness, almost like a pea. My biggest issue was with the pie crust, which was Whole Foods’ house brand. The texture was fine, but the crust was too sweet for a savory dish.

In any case, the basic custard recipe is the important thing here. You can use whatever mix of veggies, cheese and meat you like; the only caveat is to reduce the amount of milk and cream a bit if you’re using a soft cheese.

What’s your favorite quiche?

Basic Quiche Custard
for 1 9-inch pie pan

1 c. whole milk
1 c. cream
2 whole eggs + 2 egg yolks
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Whisk all ingredients together. Add whatever elements you like to an unbaked pie crust and pour on the custard. Bake for approx. 35 minutes in a 375 degree oven.

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