Quiches

Butter, and shortening, and cream, oh my! This week I ventured into the baking realm of French cooking with two variations on quiche. The process began with two batches of pâte brisée, a basic pastry dough and pie crust. I've mentioned previously that I decided not to have any qualms about reducing the amount of fat that most of these dishes require, but I've learned that with baking one should always follow the recipe - at least the first time. Six ounces of butter and four tablespoons of shortening per crust later, my dough was ready. MAFC describes a process called fraisage which is a final blending of the dough by pressing through the dough on a flat surface to stretch it out and blend the fat and flour thoroughly. The authors describe this as a process rarely used by American cooks but a technique that distinguishes the French pastry. As with any pastry dough, the instructions emphasize working quickly and keeping the ingredients chilled to maintain lightness.

After refrigerating the dough overnight, I rolled it into a large circle with the method described in the cookbook. I have always had trouble maintaining an even consistency with rolled dough, so the instructions in MAFC were enlightening. The authors instruct flouring the work surface and rolling the dough with strokes away from you to about one inch from the far edge and turning the dough between strokes. Thus, one roll away, turn the dough 90 degrees, one roll away, turn 90 degrees... I repeated this process roughly 30 times to reach the size dough I needed to fill the pans and more flour was added occasionally to the underside to prevent sticking. Another challenge I've always faced with dough is transferring it from the counter to the pie dish. The instructions indicated the method with which I was most familiar, flipping part of the dough onto the rolling pin to lift it, and a new idea, folding the dough into fourths before laying it on the mold and unfolding it. I tried both and must say the folding was much easier to manage. Glad to learn something so useful!! Regarding the molds, Julia recommends straight edge pans with removable sides as this keeps the edges vertical and less liable to collapse. I only have one spring-form pan so one quiche was made in that dish and the other in a regular pie pan. Both required a quick pre-bake with a lining filled with beans to prevent rising of the center of the crust.

One aspect of French cooking that I've noticed differs greatly from American cooking is emphasis on fewer main components of a dish. For example, in the U.S. I've seen many quiches that have broccoli, potato, bacon, onion, and mounds of cheese all in one pie. On the contrary, French quiches emphasize one vegetable at a time and minimal cheese. The same concept is true for Americanized versions of paninis, omelettes, and crêpes - we like to stuff our food with everything at once! The quiche recipes in MAFC range from cheese only to perhaps three main ingredients. I chose quiche aux poireaux (leek quiche) and quiche aux fruits de mer (seafood quiche - any shellfish was recommended and I chose shrimp for my version because I had some on hand). For the leek quiche, the leeks were boiled for over 30 minutes in a tiny bit of water and butter; however, they turned out a little tough and probably could have used more time. The vegetable was mixed with a combination of cream, eggs, and topped with a little Swiss cheese in the dish. The seafood quiche had shallots and shrimp sautéed in a dab butter (finally a place I was able to reduce the quantity!) and deglazed with vermouth. In addition to the cream, eggs, and Swiss cheese, this recipe also called for some tomato paste. I was a little wary of the shellfish quiche as I had never heard of it and tomato paste sounded like an odd component - but it turned out to be our favorite!

Leek quiche in the spring-form pan

Look at those straight sides!

Shrimp quiche

 The sides of both shells shrank during the pre-baking phase and I'm not entirely sure why. My ideas are 1) the thickness of the dough was uneven, 2) the dishes were buttered too well in areas, and 3) there was too much butter in the crust that it did not harden well enough.

Gooey layers of quiche!

I thought the quiches were quite creamy and I would consider using a less fattening milk next time. The crust was also rather buttery and would likely turn out just as flaky with less fat.

Nestled together.

 In addition to the quiches, I also made a light salad to cleanse the palate between bites. It was simply chopped romaine with a vinaigrette of olive oil, balsamic, and Dijon I learned while living in France. The lettuce was certainly needed to cut the richness of the pastry and creaminess of the filling!

Fresh Alabama peaches!

This week's meal was my first Sunday luncheon and I was joined by my friends Lisa, Morgan, and Bryan. We finished with some fresh Chilton County peaches to accompany the remaining drops of mimosas (not pictured because we drank them eagerly!). After lunch, we played a round of Settlers of Catan, a complex game similar to Monopoly but much more suspenseful. The game quickly dissolved into fascination with building architectural structures with the playing pieces... but I won the real game! The daytime meal also meant that I could optimize on the natural sunlight for my photography which I think made a big difference. I especially like the first photograph - mysterious leek quiche... All in all we had a lovely afternoon with some new dishes and friendly competition.

In other news, I also made some juice pops this week with lemonade and fresh slices of strawberries. I had never added fruit to my frozen juice before and I was so glad that they didn't all sink to the bottom. Great afternoon snack on these hot Tuscaloosa days! And pretty too!

Suspended strawberries