Adventures In Cooking: Spinach and Feta Quiche with Home-made Crust

MONDAY, APRIL 20, 2009

3.5 stars (out of 5 - pretty good, but a lot of work when you make your own crust)

All-Butter Crust:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, cold, cut into 1/2 inch cubes (see pic)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
2 to 3 tbsp ice water

1. First, I cut the butter into cubes:

2. I then placed the butter into a food processor, and added the flour, salt, and sugar on top. You can do it by hand, but I am lazy!

3. I pulsed the food-processor approximately 10 times, until the batter resembled little peas:

4. I then added the water, 1 tablespoon at a time. When it started to stick together, I scooped it out of the processor and molded it by hand.

5. I then put it in some saran-wrap and placed it in the freezer for 10-15 minutes (during this time, I started mixing the ingredients of the quiche).

6. When it was chilled, I rolled it out with a rolling pin. I tried coating the rolling pin with flour, but it still stuck pretty badly. I rolled it out until it was just a few millimetres thick. Notice how I didn't really care about the shape of the dough (just somewhat round). This is because when you try to transfer it to the pie plate, it just falls apart anyways.

7. I then transferred the crust to the pie plate. As it falls apart, I did this in pieces and then just molded it together with my fingertips. Looks gross, but it will be covered by the quiche anyways! I then pricked it a bunch of times with a fork to prevent it from rising during baking.

8. After it was prepared, I stuck it in the oven at 350F for about 20-30 minutes. The recipe calls for it to be cooked for 20 minutes with "baking weights", but since I have no idea what those are, and nor do I care, I just do 20 minutes, check it, and then add a few minutes when it is needed. Once out of the oven, cool slightly before adding the quiche mixture.

Feta and Spinach Quiche:

1 package of frozen chopped spinach, thawed (about 300g)
3/4 package of Feta cheese, crumbled
1/2 cup cottage cheese
Green onions (about 1/2 of a small bunch), chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp dry basil (or a seasoning of your choice - I use Herbes de Provence)
1/2 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp garlic powder or garlic salt
4 eggs
1/2 cup milk

1. First, I defrosted the spinach in the microwave. I do this first so that it can cool while I mix the other ingredients. I then combined the feta, cottage cheese, green onions, olive oil, basil, pepper, and garlic powder. The recipe says to blend until smooth but I a) am too lazy, and b) like it chunky (especially the feta). I then squeezed the spinach until it was fairly dry and added it to the bowl. After it was all mixed up, I added the milk and egg.