Broccoli quiche

FOODBLOGGING!

I made this for lunch several weeks ago, and just finally finished writing it up:
(and I lost the pictures I took of it, too)

Eggless Broccoli Quiche

Not really a quiche, more of a vegetable pie.

Family recipe, based on recipes from The Age of Enlightenment Cookbook by Miriam Kasin (hereafter AoE Cookbook). Long out of print, but used copies aren't that hard to find.

First, the crust. I use a quick biscuit dough (a variant of the rolled biscuit recipe in the AoE Cookbook) for this:

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 cup unbleached white flout
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking powder*
2 tsp. sugar or honey (actually, I used 1 1/2 tsp. agave nectar this time)
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup milk**
1/3 cup water**

Sift and mix the dry ingredients and the agave. Work butter in with hands or pastry cutter. (you let it soften first, right? I didn't and had trouble as a result.) Add liquid, mix, knead a few times to make it smooth.

Butter a 9.5" or 10" pie plate (We only use glass here, so your mileage may vary at the baking stage if you use metal). Spread biscuit dough evenly across bottom and sides in your preferred manner. Use all the dough. Bake at 435 to 450 degrees (Farenheit. I've never cooked with Metric measurements) for about 7 minutes (as appropriate to your baking apparatus. But the crust should be just barely browned.)

Next, the filling. You'll want to have some feeling for steaming broccoli, as it makes the timing easier.

The filling is two parts: the broccoli (I guess other vegetables can substitute as per taste), and the sauce. This is a cream sauce with cheese melted in it.

It's possible to do both the broccoli and the sauce at the same time, or they can be separately prepared beforehand and set them aside. If you do that, steam the broccoli less and do the sauce while the crust is baking.

In this case, one rather large head of broccoli ended up being just right. (didn't think to take pictures until it was done, so can't provide a size reference. Sorry.) Chop the broccoli to medium-small pieces and steam it.

The sauce:

1/3 cup butter (ghee or olive oil work also)
1/2 cup flour (about)#
2 cups milk (can substitute cream for up to a third of this)
1/2 teaspoon salt
pinch nutmeg, if desired (I didn't this time)
grated cheese (I use sharp white cheddar) to taste (about a half cup this time, plus a bit more for on top)

Melt the butter. Add about 2/3 of the flour and cook for a minute. Stir constantly with a wisk. Make sure there are no lumps. Either reduce heat (if on gas stove) or remove from heat (if on electric) and add milk. Slowly bring heat back up. Stir more or less constantly (higher heat=more important that stirring is constant. If at low heat, it's possible to step away for long enough to, say, take the crust out of the oven or chop and steam the broccoli.) Add remainder of flower and cheese (slowly, in both cases. I add the cheese a bit [say 1/3] at a time and allow to melt. Not sure if this makes any difference at all.)

Take it off the heat as soon as it starts to thicken (you ARE stirring constantly, right? Because this is kind of key.)

Actually, bring the heat down low once it starts to thicken and keep it warm for a little bit longer but not too long. Experience and experimentation help a bit with that. You want the sauce thicker than a normal cream sauce but not too thick. Think pudding. Also, it will thicken a LOT more once it cools, so don't overcook.

Drain the broccoli (important! excess water will screw with the thickness of the sauce) and mix the sauce and the broccoli. Pour mixture into crust. It should be even with the top of the crust but not overflowing unless you want a hard-to-clean mess. Sprinkle grated cheese on top, if you want.

Put the whole thing back in the oven at 350 degrees for about 8 minutes, or until the cheese on top is just starting to brown. Remove and let cool a bit before serving (again, so that the sauce will thicken a bit.)

The first piece served will be a messy disaster. Seriously. Always. I have not yet found a way to avoid this. But after that, if you've gotten the sauce thickness right, it should hold together reasonably.


Failure modes (all have happened to me):

The sauce isn't thick enough due to either not enough flour, too short cook time, or too much moisture from the broccoli. As a result, you get something resembling more of a thick soup.

The crust isn't baked enough in the first baking and the sauce soaks into it too much, turning it to mush.

The broccoli doesn't cook enough or too much.

The whole thing flips over while you take it out of the oven and makes close acquaintance with your floor.

It's too close to the top heating element and the oven runs too hot and lights it on fire.

The sauce is lumpy because it wasn't stirred in with the butter or oil enough.

You follow the biscuit recipe in the AoE Cookbook too literally and the crust ends up tasting like baking powder.


Other than that, it's pretty easy once you've done it once or twice. I wouldn't count on the first time turning out well enough to serve to friends, myself, but that's based on my personal cooking quirks. :)

Enjoy!

*the AoE Cookbook has a typo in the recipe in that it calls for a tablespoon instead of a teaspoon here. This results in disaster.

**the original calls for all the liquid to be milk.

# Ordinarily, you'd use 1/4 cup flour for this sauce, but in this case you want the sauce thicker.