Garden Quiche (Florence Fletcher)

Ok, so here I was thinking it had only been a few weeks since I last updated. Turns out I was way off...

That doesn't mean that I have stopped cooking though! As promised, I bring you grandma's quiche recipe today. This is by far one of my favourite recipes in this little box. One that I know very well and always looked forward to when she made it. Seriously, egg with pastry. Does it get much better?

One of my favourite things about quiche is it's really an "anytime" kind of meal. Winter, summer... Morning, evening. I've made it for Easter brunch, and I've made it for a casual Sunday night dinner. When in a pinch, make a quiche.

This recipe belongs to Florence Fletcher. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of Florence ("Flo"*), but I know they are around. My grandma had a wonderful album from her time working for the war effort some place in Quebec. I believe my brother still has the album, so I'll scan a photo and post it as an update soon. Until then, I thought I would share this absolutely wonderful photo of my grandpa helping my grandma up on to a tree stump. I adore this photo.


The Recipe Card:

The Process:

This is such a super easy and quick recipe to make. If you're using frozen prepared pie shells, it's even quicker. The majority of my time in the kitchen was spent making (and braiding) the pastry. In fact, it took so long to make the pastry that I worked up quite an appetite. My absolutely darling husband made me a gourmet snack of toast with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon. He should start his own blog, don't you think?!

I prepared my pie shells and placed the broccoli inside and then sprinkled with the (delicious) cheese.

You will notice that with the second pie crust, I did not braid the edge. I needed to save time and my sanity. I opted for a very classy fork-design-in-the-edge option, a la Stouffer's Chicken Pot Pie.

Whisk together the soup mix, basic, milk and eggs.

Pour over the broccoli/cheese and you're done like dinner. 

Pop it in the oven for 40-45 minutes and socialize with your brother, sister-in-law and adorable nephew while you wait. This last part is optional, but highly recommended.

Yum!

The Recipe:

Ingredients:
1 Knorr Leek soup mix
1 pkg frozen broccoli thawed & drained
1-1/2 cups grated Gruyere Cheese (see notes)
2 unbaked pie shells (coming soon!)
1/2 tsp dry Basil
4 medium Eggs
1-1/2 cups 2% Milk

Directions:
Over 375.
Arrange broccoli and cheese in pie shells.
Whisk soup mix and basil with eggs and milk.
Pour into shells.
Cook 40-45 minutes
Cool 10 minutes


My Personal Notes:

I remember one time I tried to make this for a small group of friends that I was having over. I was probably around 15 or so. Natalie, Ben, Nick and Marieka were coming to "hang out" and I thought it would be grand to show them how fabulous I was in the kitchen. When I got to the part in the recipe about adding the Knorr soup mix, I figured you actually had to prepare the soup as per the instructions on the package, and then add it to the recipe. Needless to say, we had a very sloppy quiche that night. I highly recommend not doing that!

• I used fresh broccoli, not frozen/thawed/drained. I know, I'm such a traditionalist. 
• If you're at all like me, you have no idea what Gruyere cheese is and why it's any different than cheddar (which I was going to get until I realized I have access to infinite information in the palm of my hands -or more accurately, the bottom of my purse- my iPhone!). I pulled over in the cheese and deli section of the grocery store and quickly googled Gruyere Cheese. It is in the swiss family and is named after the city Gruyere in Switzerland. It's also ridiculously expensive and tasty as all get-out. Mine looked like this and cost around $8-$9. It yielded almost the 1-1/2 cups. 

• As it turns out, non-fancy crust tastes just as good as fancy crust. 

My husband has an aversion to quiche that I don't quite understand. Regardless, he suffered through and ate it all, saying "for quiche, it was OK". I've got to take what I can get ;)

Please give it a try!

Up next, I'm going to share the Pastry recipe I used for this. It surprised me some of the ingredients in it, but it was hands-down the best, flakiest pastry I've made.

*~Tara-Jane~*


*A little bit of "history"
My grandmother always used to address cards with the recipients name on the envelope, but the name was always in quotes. I would get a card addressed to "Tara-Jane", as if to say "if that is your real name". It was so endearing. These are the small things I remember about my grandmother - the things that will never be forgotten. My brother and I often sign our cards like this, just for fun because it makes us smile. 

I love you, "grandma".