Quiche Lorraine

I cheat and use store-bought shortcrust pastry with my quiches. If you have the time to wait for the dough to rest, and don’t mind clearing up the mess (which I always seem to make tons of whenever making pastry) go right ahead.

Quiche Lorraine reminds me of growing up in the suburbs in Sydney and having a slice of quiche with a salad on the side. You can’t really not like it – salty bacon and sweet sauteed onions enveloped in a warm eggy pillow – with pastry. It’s pretty easy, too – just make sure you blind bake your base properly, or it will end up soggy instead of crispy and short, giving you good contrasting textures with each bite.

Ingredients

1. 1 -2 sheets ready made shortcrust pastry
2. 1 large onion, diced
3. 6 rashers (or more if you want) bacon, diced
4. 200ml heavy cream
5. 3 eggs
6. 1 cup grated gruyere or cheddar cheese
7. salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Preheat oven to 200C/390F
2. Line the base and sides of a loose-bottomed tart tin with the pastry
3. Prick the base, line with baking paper and add pie weights/rice/beans before blind baking in the oven for 15 minutes
4. Remove the baking paper and pie weights and put back in the oven for an additional 5-10 minutes until cooked through and lightly browned
5. While the base is baking, make your filling
6. Sautee the bacon on medium-high heat until brown and crispy and remove from frying pan to cool
7. Reduce the heat to low and cook onions until soft and translucent
8. Mix cream, eggs, cheese together in a jug.
9. Season with salt and pepper – remember not to oversalt as the bacon and cheese will provide additional seasoning
10. Once the base is ready, sprinkle your bacon and onion on the base, and pour in the eggy/cheese mix over
11. Reduce the oven temperature to 160C/320F and bake quiche for 30 minutes or the middle is just wobbly (it will continue to cook a little more once out of the oven)
12. Remove from oven, let sit for 5 minutes before removing quiche from the tin
13. Enjoy hot or cold as leftovers the next day😉