Quiche Lorraine Recipe for Easter Brunch

If Anthony Bourdain ever comes over, I'm making quiche. It's my go-to recipe for when I have to produce something basic but fairly impressive. If you think people will be turned off by the idea of quiche (admittedly not such a risk since it's become less trendy than it was 20 or so years ago), you can always call it ham-and-cheese pie.

I've made it on the fly in many places: at a spontaneous whatever's-in-the-fridge dinner at a friend's house on the Toronto Islands (where you can't run out for extra groceries); at a post-bike-race courier get-together (and it's no joke to feed a posse of famished bike messengers), at a guest house in the Jura region of France, where I used Comté cheese (which was fabulous).

This year I made it for an Easter brunch. In fact, I made two, and they turned out very well indeed. Here's my recipe for a pair of quiches. I love eating it cold the next day, by the way, but they do reheat fairly well.

Pie Crust for Two Quiche Pans

This is my mother's pie crust recipe, which she came up with after intensive experimentation in about 1957. It will be best if you have time to make it in the evening and refrigerate it in two separate balls, wrapped in plastic or waxed paper, overnight.

• 3 cups flour
• 1 cup lard
• ½ cup very cold water
• pinch of salt

1. With a knife or pastry blender, cut up lard into small cubes.
2. Add flour and salt and continue to cut up until well blended. It should have a consistency like meal. (You can use cool fingers at the end, in a gentle pinching, flicking motion).
3. Add water a bit at a time. A whisk is useful at this stage for blending. Don't overwork it; it should remain flaky instead of coming together into a smooth mass like clay.
4. Divide into two equal parts and gently press together two balls. Wrap each one in plastic or waxed paper and allow to rest, chilled, for at least half an hour.
5. When you're ready to roll the dough, press each ball into a slightly flattened round, repairing any major cracks in the edges as you do so. Using a rolling pin or wine bottle, roll out on a floured surface, reflouring both the counter and the roller as needed.
6. When the dough is evenly rolled and about ¼" thick, roll it onto the rolling pin to lift it in one piece into the quiche pan or pie plate. Unroll it and gently tuck it into the pan. Trim the edges with scissors or a knife, leaving about 1½" to 2" of overhang.
7. Fold the dough under and tuck the edges inside the lip of the pan, then pinch the edges all the way around to make a raised, fluted crust.
8. Using a fork, pierce the bottom of the crust in about half a dozen places.

Quiche Filling

• 200-250 g (about ½ pound) very thinly sliced Black Forest ham or equivalent, cut into fine strips or squares
• 200-250 g (about ½ pound) Swiss cheese, very finely grated
• 8 eggs (at room temperature)
• 5 cups of milk (at room temperature)
• ¼ tsp grated nutmeg
• ¼ tsp pepper (grey or white or black)
• pinch of salt

1. Preheat oven to 425°F
2. Layer the ham and cheese evenly over the bottom of the two pans.
3. In a medium-sized bowl, use a fork or whisk to beat the eggs until they're slightly frothy.
4. Add the milk, nutmeg, pepper and salt, and continue to beat until the mixture is well combined and slightly frothy.
5. Divide the egg mixture between the two quiche pans or pie plates. Don't fill over the top of the pan, because the raised crust is probably not strong enough to hold the filling in while it's baking, and it's annoying to have eggs all over the inside of your oven.
6. Bake at 425°F for 15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350°F. Continue to bake for about 45 more minutes, until the top is slightly browned in a few places. The filling should still be just a little jiggly but not at all liquid.
7. Allow to rest for about 20 minutes before serving. The centre of the quiches will sink a bit.
8. Serve as a main course with a green salad or as part of a larger meal.

Variations:

• For the milk: You can make it richer, with half-and-half, or even switching out a cup or so of milk with whipping cream. Or you can go leaner; I've made it with 2% milk, or with equal parts milk and yogurt.
• For the cheese: You can use any hardish, gratable cheese (but I wouldn't use a blue cheese). As mentioned above, Comté is divine; I also like to use fairly old cheddar. You can use up bits and pieces of dried-out cheese from the back of the fridge.
• For the ham: You can substitute bacon, but fry it fairly crispy first, and drain it well. I expect other salty preserved meats would be nice, but the quiche should have a light, sweet flavour, so I wouldn't advise using things cured with garlic or other strong heavy tastes. A maple-cured meat would be fine, I think.
• Veggie (but not vegan) variation: Various types of mushrooms, sweet peppers and onions are delicious instead of the meat. I'd still avoid garlic, but I think broccoli, asparagus or cauliflower could be nice. They must be chopped fairly small and sweated first, perhaps in olive oil, until they lose a good deal of moisture. (I learned this by trial and error as a teenager. I used to actually slit holes in the bottom of an aluminum pie pan to let the extra moisture drain out of my cooked quiches until I learned about sweating the vegetables first.)

If you only want to make one quiche, you can halve this recipe, but the results will be better with two.

This extra photo from our Easter brunch is only here because I'm so pleased with myself for making hot cross buns and my best-yet loaf of plain white bread (already half eaten in this picture). The excellent fruit loaf is from my mother's charming neighbour Polly.