rewards
Recipe: quiche
This past Saturday marked three years since we moved to Colorado. In celebration, we did nothing. We celebrate living here every day, folks. As if the ski and flower porn weren’t enough to convince you of how much we love it… Actually we did something this weekend, but it had nothing to do with the 3-year mark and everything to do with the summer bloom in the mountains.
yeah, puppy came along too
Talk to people around Colorado and many of them will swoon when you say the words Crested Butte. The skiing is phenomenal, the mountain biking world class, the wildflowers are some of the best in the country. The mountains and forests will take your breath away with dramatic expanses of wilderness in every direction. The town is charming, quaint and high end. Everyone has their reason for loving Crested Butte. It’s also a favorite for nature photographers.
poor air quality due to a wildfire 30 miles away
I called this trip a vacay in the previous post, but it was really work. Anytime I plan to actively shoot it becomes work. We woke up at 4 am in the mornings and weren’t done shooting until after 9 pm (and driving past 10 pm). It’s all dictated by the light and we were exhausted when we got home today. Jeremy commented that he gets much more sleep when I shoot the fall colors ;) True dat.
flowers abound
Probably not a one of you would have considered this a relaxing trip. It wasn’t relaxing, but it was rewarding.
So I have another savory recipe in my archives here… It’s a good recipe because it has bacon in it. Precious, lovely, beautiful bacon. I always double the recipe because it actually tastes better the next day after the flavors have had 24 hours to blend together, but we’re too impatient to wait that long when it comes out of the oven smelling like the dinner you so want to eat.
cutting the shortening
pressed pie crust dough
While I abhor those pre-made pie crusts you can buy at the store, I am just about the laziest pie crust maker ever. I probably overmix my dough and it’s too crumby and not flaky enough. Maybe one day when I start to care, I’ll start to improve my technique. I guess I just add more bacon to the filling, because bacon masks any deficiencies in a quiche.
mixing milk, eggs, and the goodies
toss the gruyère with flour
The gruyère adds a lovely dimension to the flavors. I used to use any old Swiss cheese when I first starting baking quiche. Then one night I had leftover gruyère from a party and used that instead. We have never looked back.
fill the pie shells
baked and ready to serve
The biggest problem I have with serving quiche right out of the oven is the ooze factor. You know what I’m talking about – cut one slice and the rest of the quiche seems to slo-mo vomit into the space you just vacated. This last time I made the quiche, it came out of the oven and we rushed off to… shoot some wildflowers. We were back within 20 minutes, but that 20 minutes of rest time for the quiche set it up nicely and no one was vomiting anything after the initial slice. Nice.
perfect with some salad on the side
Quiche
[print recipe]
1 pie crust
3 eggs, beaten
1 1/2 cups milk
6 strips bacon, cooked and crumbled
1 medium onion, minced and sautéed
1 cup mushrooms, sliced and sautéed
1 head broccoli, chopped and blanched
1 1/2 cups gruyère, shredded
1 tbsp flour
1/4 tsp salt
pie crust
from Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book
1 1/4 cups flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup shortening or lard
3-4 tbsps cold water
Mix together the flour and salt in a mixing bowl. Cut in the shortening until it is in pea-sized pieces. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of water over the mixture and toss with fork. Repeat until all is moistened and form dough into a ball. Roll dough out on lightly floured surface, rolling from center to edges until about 12 inches in diameter. Press and form into a 9-inch pie plate.
Quiche: Line the pie crust with foil and bake at 450°F for 5 minutes. Bake another 5-7 minutes with the foil off. Remove from oven. Reduce oven to 325°F. In a large bowl, stir together the eggs, milk, onion, bacon, broccoli, mushrooms, and salt. In a separate bowl, toss the cheese and flour together. Add the cheese to the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Pour into pie crust and bake 35-40 minutes. Let quiche rest out of the oven for 15 minutes before serving. The flavor really improves if eaten the next day (which is why I make two quiches at a time).
July 13th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Colorado seems like a great place to live! I love the landscapes and luxurious flower beds! Wonderful!
Your Quiche looks tasty and very enjoyable!
Cheers,
Rosa
July 14th, 2008 at 1:21 am
Ok, get ready for a major suck up athon, but seriously I LOVE YOUR BLOG. Slo mo vomit had me chuckling out loud. Whenever I read what you’ve been doing and cooking (and I check in daily) it always encourages me to do better in my cooking, try new things and educate myself on previously intimidating techniques. I have one question…. Do you actually sleep? I often wonder because you seem to cram just so much into a day. Thankyou for generously sharing your life with all your readers. PS is there ANYTHING bacon can’t do (as my husband often asks)?
July 14th, 2008 at 1:54 am
You should learn to do the cream cheese pie crust. So easy(I like you am too lazy to care about making good pie crust) and turns out good everytime. Plus it works great for either sweet or savory.
You feel they way about Colorado the way I feel about Washington. Though CO was number three on our list of states we would live it.
I am more of a Wolf Creek Pass girl myself.
July 14th, 2008 at 3:30 am
I’m really envious of you staying in a beautiful environment with lots of pretty landscapes! “We celebrate living here everyday” It’s so nice to know there are still people who treasures what they have this moment! Too many people wants bigger houses and bigger cars without appreciating what they already have!
Jen, are you actually a perfectionist at heart? All your work turns out so good-looking! I love pies!! And tarts!! I love your pie!
July 14th, 2008 at 4:16 am
Yes, you are so lucky to live there! I am going in 2 weeks and I cannot wait!
July 14th, 2008 at 4:46 am
That looks like paradise ( the mountains) and the quiche looks just perfect.
July 14th, 2008 at 7:39 am
OOOhh yay! I just did my first quiche the other day with roasted summer veggies and it was so good. It is so good the next day as well and I’ve been eating it for breakfast every day. And I plan to do another with the zucchini and crook necks that are ready in the garden this week. This looks wonderful – I was thinking of adding some bacon or pancetta next time too. Yum! I did gouda and feta in mine – loved those chunks of feta in every bite. mmmmmm
And I made your marinated flank steak on Friday – huge hit. Ate it with the quiche actually. And the leftovers were repurposed as a thai beef salad last night. Amazing, amazing stuff.
For the last year I’ve been telling my husband I want to move to Boulder. I’ve never even been, and it was long before I found your blog, but there was just this thing in the back of my head that I wanted to live there some day. Your pictures of the beauty of CO make it all the more tempting!!!
July 14th, 2008 at 8:25 am
What breathtaking scenery! You’ve captured it spectacularly! I feel as if I could reach out and pluck one of those perfect flowers right off of the screen. People always tell me how lucky I am to live where I live, but we don’t have sights like that. Mr. SGCC and I keep dreaming about making the move out there, but he says they have worse Tort Reform laws than here, so we’d probably starve. I can still dream through you, though. Sigh…..someday……..
Beautiful quiche, too. One of my fave things to whip up when it’s 98 in the shade!
July 14th, 2008 at 8:58 am
Crested Butte! Count me in on those who swoon when you say it! My family will be taking our annual trip there next week (some of us from DC area and some from Texas). One of my favorite places on Earth. :)
P.S. I am always jealous of the beautiful landscapes you see on a regular basis. If I could survive the winters in CO, we would absolutely move there. Maybe someday we will.
July 14th, 2008 at 9:04 am
Bacon, mushrooms, and onions? I yam there! :) I don’t think it’s going to be much more of an effort to produce a flaky crust– just stop as soon as you get pea-sized butter chunks (I always used to go past this point– my obsessive self won’t stop until it gets MEAL, dammit!), such that the dough is very streaky. Plus, work in a cold kitchen (but you should have no problem on that front, forever and ever, hah). I’m not sure if chilling the dough after bringing it together helps– I think the Tartine people recommend it.
All the pictures are breathtaking, but I want to call special attention to the one where Jeremy is walking away– the plants look like green flames. Lovely. :)
July 14th, 2008 at 9:08 am
Just found your blog…I love it! :)
The quiche looks wonderful and I am loving the visual of the “slo-mo vomit”. :) Yep…that’s exactly the way to describe it!!!
Looking forward to reading through all of your posts!
~Bridget
July 14th, 2008 at 10:39 am
Colorado is beautiful. I visited Golden and Boulder many years ago. My friends took me out to a really fun restaurant at the time called the Casa Bonita. It had divers and mini waterfalls inside. It was really crazy! Anyhow, your quiche looks great. I will have to try it!!!!
July 14th, 2008 at 10:49 am
Hi Jen-jen. I think pie crusts with butter are generally flakier than those with shortening.
Glad you guys had fun in Crusty Butt. Ahh, Crusty Butt, so nice.
I made pulled pork last night. Tragically, every bite reminded me of the time when Andrew convinced me to drink cider vinegar when I had puking food poisoning (he read something on the internet, don’t ask me). I’ll spare you the details but that was the WORST MISTAKE EVER. And now I think of that when I eat Carolina BBQ. Super. Hopefully in another, I dunno, 10 years I’ll be able to stomach cider vinegar again.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
This quiche looks delicious. I’m a lazy crust maker too and should work on that. :) I love the combination of ingredients in your quiche, and I’ve never used gruyere – usually just any old swiss – I’ll have to it out!
July 14th, 2008 at 1:57 pm
ah rushed off after your quiche came out of the oven to “shoot some wildflowers”, though i’ve never heard that euphemism, i’ve found that some of the most enjoyable times i’ve ever had with my girlfriend were in the kitchen. it’s kind of an odd bond that cooking creates and one that i’m glad we can share. just thought i’d leave my two cents and let you know how much i appreciate this blog. best of times and health to you and your loved ones.
July 14th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
I’m due to make a Quiche. Beautiful pictures!
July 14th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Bloody wildfires.
Ah, Quiche. It seems as though my whole life has been riddled with the stuff, but that won’t stop me drooling over this one!
July 14th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
I make my pie crust with real butter and ice cold water … then I make two balls, cover in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 1 hour. It makes it tough to roll out, but the end result is tender, flaky, and very flavorful. Plus, I use a bit of crushed up Celtic sea salt … good stuff!
Your quiche looks absolutely delicious … I am sad to say that I am allergic to pork, but I will just have to find a suitable substitution. Paired with your vibrant salad, this makes for a wonderful summer meal. Thank you for sharing.
Your pictures are beautiful and the land where you live is visually stunning!
http://www.mylittlecosmos.com
July 14th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
The very first time I have been to your blog and can’t wait to come back again. When your page came up there were some of my very favorite things all on the same post. I love Colorado, I have 2 daughters and their families there. I love the flowers and the mountains still covered with snow. I love real butter and have just learned this past fall that I love quiche and yours looks wonderful!
July 14th, 2008 at 7:50 pm
Oh my! That quiche looks delicious. Of course, I could eat anything if it had bacon in it. Beef tongue? Oh yes just wrap it in bacon. I’m also quite jealous of your flowers. I used to go on wildflower hikes with my grandfather, but our flowers were never so grand as that.
It’s so wonderful you appreciate your amazing surroundings each and every day.
July 15th, 2008 at 3:38 am
Your quiche looks delicious as does your salad to the side! Yumm!
Beautiful photos. I love appreciating the beauty all around the world thru the blogs I have visited!
July 15th, 2008 at 5:41 am
Hee hee Crested Butte. I’m sorry :) …New Zealand has some funny place names too. Those golden flowers look just – gorgeous – I have senstive skin but I just want to go roll in them. The quiche sounds delicious, especially with the bacon in there!
July 15th, 2008 at 8:20 am
I love quiche so much but never get around to make it (I have only made it once, it was a hears of palm quiche).
This is so delicious, Jen!
July 15th, 2008 at 7:48 pm
That looks really tasty! Nice photos!
July 16th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
The quiche was out of this world tasty! My husband (who tends to think he’s a manly man) gave me the highest compliment possible, by asking for seconds and even taking it to the office for lunch yesterday! I’m marinating a flank steak as I type, ala you and making the yummy looking pizza for dinner tonight. I am so thrilled to have stumbled upon your blog, you have reinspired me out of my cooking doldrums…an inspiration! Thanks a million!
July 17th, 2008 at 10:07 am
Rosa – I quite like it here. If you are ever this way in summer, you will have a lot of eye candy to enjoy :)
Melinda – oh, I love it when people get my stupid humor, it means we’re on a similar wavelength! The answer to your question is yes, I do sleep, but I don’t like to sleep :) So I tend not to sleep much in favor of doing other things because I like to Do Stuff. And yes, bacon is like the most wondrous and fabulous food. If it didn’t make such a mess, I’d sleep with a rash of bacon under my pillow… but then I’d not be able to sleep and would just get up and fry the bacon and eat it – har har har.
Peabody – oooh, I did not know about this cream cheese pie crust you speak of! Must research… Actually, I feel the way about Colorado the way I feel about Washington. We were choosing between CO and WA for where to settle down. Imagine that, Peabody – we might have been NEIGHBORS. OMG, wouldn’t that have been a hoot?
Mrs. E – oh yeah, I hate big houses and big cars. They make me cringe. People always want more. After all the crap I’ve been through, I just want to enjoy what I’ve got. I’ve got a lot though – great friends, loving family, AMAZING partner, crazy dog, and a fantastic community of blog friends (that means you too). xxoo
Aran – Oooh, you’re going to Crusty Butt?? Have a great time!
Maya – the mountains are quite therapeutic :)
Mollie – I’m hella-jealous of your garden and I don’t even know what a crookneck is! Boulder is a nice place if you’re of that bent. Definitely venture a visit at least. It’s a fun town although I do miss the cultural diversity of a place like Los Angeles. Still, I cannot complain much because I really like it here!
Susan – Oh yeah, my FIL is a law-talkin’ guy and he lives in CO (he used to live in NM). Has some interesting insights into the laws here… What you should do is ramp up the food blog, quit yer day job and move out here. Live off the blog and just cook and bake – with me! :) xxoo
Tipperella – That should be so nice, the flowers will be at peak! Oh, the winters here… they are quite long. I love winter and by April I am starting to get punchy. Not sure how someone would fare if they weren’t so crazy about winter ;)
Mark – I think I’m just a lazy butt. That and we have no AC in the house, so when it gets warm it stays warm and the butter chunks turn into butter ooze and well… you know the rest. Come September, it won’t be a problem ;) Yeah, that plant is called corn lily or false hellebore. Neat plant. They can grow to incredible heights!
Bridget – thank you and happy to have you!
Debbie – thanks!
Nicole!!!!!! – You’re right, but I have all this damn shortening to use up/get rid of… Why do they sell in threes?!? That story about pulled pork and Andrew’s cider vinegar remedy makes me sad for you :( Give him a big huggles for me. I miss you guys so much!
Carmen – yes, try the gruyère! You will lurve it.
Jason – hmmmm, no really… we went to shoot the local wildflowers. See, I do a lot of nature photography (the pics in this post maybe hint at that) and the light at sunset is really good and there is only a small window of time to catch it. If I wanted to say we had sex, I would have said, “we had awesome amazing sex.” No need for euphemisms. This is not the Disney Channel :) Glad you enjoy the blog. All the best to you and yours!!
Stacie – thanks!
Graeme – you lucky dawg! I rarely ate quiche as a kid (quiche in a Chinese household?!). It’s the bacon, isn’t it? :)
Kathy – I should do that. Embarrassing that it’s the name of my blog: use real butter – but I used shortening. doh! Don’t tell anyone I said this but… even if you omit the bacon, it tastes quite delicious :)
Danetta – well, I’m really glad you dropped by to visit! Thank you :)
SweetBird – thanks! I think that’s incredibly sweet that you used to hike with your grandfather. Aren’t grandparents wonderful?
HoneyB – thank you :)
Laura – yeah, Crested Butte is the name of the mountain (a big… crested butte!) but the nickname Crusty Butt is so much fun to say ;) Don’t go rolling in the flowers! I think some have pricklies! :)
Patricia – hearts of palm? I’m there! Love that stuff!
Kevin – thanks sweetie :)
Lezel – wow, you made it! Great!! I’m so happy that you are finding recipes that you like. The flank steak is a real winner (so easy and yet so good!)
July 18th, 2008 at 11:31 am
One of my favorite foods made by one of my favorite people…Yeah :)
July 22nd, 2008 at 8:35 am
Gorgeous pictures…I use to live in Colorado. It’s beautiful.
I love the step by step quiche pictures. The salad next to the slice looks amazing.
July 22nd, 2008 at 9:15 am
Tartelette – awww, you are just too sweet :) I hope we can get together and bake up a storm some day (prefer winter though – too hot for summer baking!)
Alexa – thank you!
August 21st, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Awesomely beautiful – great pics. I’m bookmarking your site :)
August 24th, 2008 at 3:39 am
[…] curious about quiche. It isn’t something commonly eaten in Singapore. So, when I came across this recipe from Use Real Butter, it went straight into my bookmarks. Of course, the gorgeous pictures there […]
August 27th, 2008 at 10:20 am
Mia – thank you!
April 22nd, 2009 at 4:06 pm
[…] Source: crust adapted from Williams Sonoma, quiche adapted from Use Real Butter […]
September 29th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
[…] FillingAdapted from Use Real Butter […]
December 19th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
I can’t wait to give this Quiche a try! It’s hard to find a good quiche and this one looks terrific.
Beautiful photo’s by the way. ^^
June 9th, 2014 at 1:42 am
[…] sorry. I did one without the smoked bacon but honestly, using the bacon, and as mentioned on userealbutter’s site, the flavour of the quiche does improve the next day. I do not know if the culprit is the […]
July 8th, 2014 at 8:38 am
[…] 3.2.1311 Modified version of this recipe […]
August 18th, 2014 at 5:45 pm
I lived in the Ouray/Ridgway area for a couple of years and loved it. For those of you who wish you could move somewhere special and don’t know how to accomplish it, just do it. You just do it. Somehow you can survive anywhere for a year. I taught tourists how to pan for gold in the summer, and actually became so good at it, I began to make a little money at it myself! I found a teaching job and make good use of myself in the area. All the while I took in the beauty of the most amazing place on this earth. I don’t regret one day of it, although it was incredibly hard. I was hungry but innovative. My alfredo sauce started with a base made from the Cremora jar sitting next to the coffee. It wasn’t bad!
September 30th, 2014 at 12:33 pm
[…] 3.2.1311 Aanpassing van dit recept […]