Smoked Gouda & Spinach Quiche

I am always ripping recipes out of magazines and newspapers. I call it a hobby, my ripping and then sorting and creating binders filled with recipes. My dad calls it crazy. Some might call it silly. Or obsessive. And some might wonder why I even need recipes for things like quiche.

Making our own quiche crust meant we could try out our new rolling pin rings. We have the yellow, or 1/8 inch rings, on the ends of the rolling pin. They ended up not being too helpful since a 10 inch circle exceeded the length of the rolling pin, but I have high hopes for the rings helping us with rolled cookies.

Here's why: I stink at cooking eggs. Any kind of egg. Also, I'm not good at just 'winging it' for some dishes, and quiche is one of those dishes. Sure, I know all about milk-egg ratios and how skim-whole-cream will affect the quiche. I have lots of ingredient ideas. Yet left on my own, I will muck it up. Too many filling goodies or too much egg or too wet or... too something. I need a recipe. I need supervision.

Ready to go in the oven

A bit before Mother's Day, I ripped a recipe out of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Smoked Gouda, Green Onion, and Spinach Quiche. I thought this quiche would be a great way to use up some of our CSA goodies. And it was - we had CSA spinach and green onions to use.

While the quiche baked, we sauteed the rest of the CSA green onions/garlic with the CSA collard greens & kale in some olive oil and bacon grease. I think we used up all our CSA leafy green stuff and all the green onions/garlic. Finally!

At first glance, the quiche looked done. I had a few reservations because I didn't see much browning on top, but SP thought it looked puffed and set and ready. When we cut into it, it oozed uncooked wetness:

Whoops. So we put it in for another 10-15 minutes and enjoyed the sauteed greens. Well, SP ate them. I am not a fan of sauteed greens like this.

The second time we took the quiche out, it was nicely browned on top and when we started to cut into it, there wasn't any wetness.

This was delicious! Not too eggy. Not too spinachy but a very nice flavor of spinach. Just enough smoked gouda to make it taste cheesy and smokey. We both thought the smoke flavor from the smoked gouda almost made you think you were eating some bacon in the quiche. A lovely but not too strong onion flavor from the green onions. Each forkful seemed to just melt in my mouth. Of course, we used whole milk instead of 1% milk, so maybe that's why it tasted so rich and creamy and melty.

We didn't use the recipe's crust recipe. Instead, we stuck with our trusty Joy of Baking Flaky Pie Dough recipe that we used for a peach pie last Labor Day and for pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. It's a very easy dough to make and to work with. Since this was a quiche, we blind baked the crust so we got to use our pie weights.

This might now be my favorite quiche, I'm not sure. I really, really like the Asparagus-Havarti one my mom and I like to make. But this Smoked Gouda-Spinach one is darn tasty, too.

Recipe found in 10 May 2012 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
SPINACH, GREEN ONION AND SMOKED GOUDA QUICHE

PG tested

For the crust

• 6 tablespoons butter, softened
• 2 tablespoons 1-percent-fat milk
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 large egg yolk
• 5 to 6 ounces all-purpose flour (about 1 1/4 cups)
• For the filling
• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
• 1/2 cup thin-sliced green onions
• 3 cups fresh baby spinach
• 1 cup 1-percent-fat milk
• 3/4 cup (3 ounces) grated smoked Gouda cheese
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• Dash of grated nutmeg
• 3 large eggs

Place butter in a large bowl, beat with a mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy. Combine milk, salt and egg yolk in a small bowl; stir well with a whisk. Add milk to butter, 1 tablespoon at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour; beat just until combined. Press mixture into a 4-inch circle on plastic wrap and wrap up. Chill 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Unwrap and place chilled dough on a lightly floured surface. Roll dough into a 10-inch circle. Fit dough into a 9-inch pie plate. Freeze 15 minutes. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool.

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onions; saute 5 minutes or until tender. Add spinach; saute 2 minutes.

Combine 1 cup milk and remaining ingredients in a bowl; stir well with a whisk. Stir in spinach mixture. Pour filling into crust. Bake 35 minutes. Cut into 10 wedges.

-- "Cooking Light Comfort Food: Home-Cooked Delicious Classics Made Light" (Oxmoor House, 2011, $24.95)

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/life/kitchen-mailbox/for-moms-special-day-brunch-at-home-635213/#ixzz1wqXPZIle