This week we ventured into savory pies! I was very excited for this week; I was ready to cook big hunks of meat for a big hearty pie. Unfortunately, this was the week I decided to sprain my ankle. So, I settled for a quiche, something that could be made in one day, relatively quickly. With my savory pie, I still wanted to push myself a bit even though I had physically constraints. So, I decided to try out a cream cheese crust and decided to transform for my favorite omelette contents into a quiche.
The cream cheese crust was something I stumbled across while looking on the internet for alternative fats in pastry dough. I used a mish-mosh of a couple different crust recipes and mostly I was surprised at how little flour (only 1 cup!) it used in comparison to the butter and cream cheese. Albeit this was the first single crust pie I have made, so things are already halved from what I was used to , but still there was a lot of fat in comparison to flour. Also the water was mostly optional in recipes I looked at, I definitely needed it; they must live in some ridiculously humid places. Once everything was sorted out, it mixed fine and rolled out nicely.
Next, on to all the things going on inside of the quiche. I chopped up my mushrooms and my onions (Moment of pride: I evaded watery eyes through some miracle) and set about cooking them. I had to make them in two batches because they couldn’t all fit in one pan, and because I was terribly afraid of crowding the mushrooms. Both Julia Child’s and my mother’s voice keep saying the mantra “don’t crowd the mushrooms” over and over again in my head. The first batch went well, but I guess the second one was slightly larger and they definitely got a little too much steam from their own juices.
But we must move on. Assembling the pie was super easy. The mushrooms, onions, and goat cheese all went in the bottom and then I just poured in the egg mixture, filling in the crust quite nicely.
Then into the oven it went.
I think, aesthetically, this is the best pie I have made yet (this is my third pie, so there is a low bar). Everything is evenly golden and delicious looking. The only thing I might have changed was to perhaps add some chives into the egg mixture, so that I might have a pop of green. Unfortunately the forces at be made it so that I couldn’t actually taste the quiche I made. Hopefully it was good? I’ll have to make it again for myself sometime so I can see if I actually succeeded.
Mushroom, Onion, and Goat Cheese Quiche in a Cream Cheese Crust
Ingredients:
- Crust:
- 1 cup flour
- 4 oz cream cheese
- 4 oz butter
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 tbs cold water
- Filling:
- 4 eggs
- 3/4 cup half and half
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp pepper
- 1/2 tsp ground mustard
- 4 oz goat cheese
- 5 oz mushrooms of your choice
- 1 small sweet onion, thinly sliced
- 3 tbs butter
Directions:
- Crust: Cut butter and cream cheese into 1/4 inch pats and combine with flour and salt. Work butter and cream cheese in until all chunks are no larger than pea-sized. Add water if pastry is still looking crumbly. Form into disk and put in fridge until firm. Once firm, roll out and put into pie plate.
- Filling: Cook mushrooms and onions in a sautee pan, with butter and salt and pepper to taste, until most of the moisture has left the mushrooms and the onions are nicely caramelized. Put in a bowl and set aside. In a large mixing bowl whisk together the half and half, eggs, salt, pepper, and ground mustard.
- Putting it All Together: Evenly distribute the mushrooms and onions over the bottom of the pie crust. The place 1/4 inch thick rounds of goat cheese on top of them. Pour in egg mixture. Bake at 375 for 45 minutes.
Tagged: cream cheese crust, goat cheese, mushrooms, quiche, Savory
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