Saturday, March 14, 2015

Pi day pie – a rustic quiche

I was supposed to host a brunch today for my fellow nerds who wanted to mark the best Pi Day of our lives (3/14/15 9:26:59) by eating pie together. Alas, the best laid plans were laid aside when I slipped on ice in my driveway last Sunday and fell hard and twisted my left knee. It's healing, but I couldn't possibly host anything today.

But we did have pie this morning. I decided to try to make a pie that didn't require a lot of measuring or extra fat and could be committed to memory. Here's what I came up with and it was very tasty.

If you don't have ham, use crumbled cooked bacon or sausage or sliced hot dogs. If you don't have chopped fresh kale, used thawed chopped spinach squeezed until dry. Any medium hard cheese you like will do. Chopped green onions or any color chopped bell peppers would be good, too. And if you like it spicy, use cayenne pepper instead of nutmeg. If you don't have a 7-inch spring-form pan, an 8-inch pie plate will do.


Lori K's rustic quiche for two 

 Crust
½ stick of frozen butter (2 oz)
1 cup whole-wheat flour
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ cup ice cold water

Filling
2 eggs, beaten
¼ cup Greek yogurt
¼ cup skim milk
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon salt
⅛ teaspoon black pepper
2 slices of deli ham, chopped
½ cup chopped kale
¼ cup part-skim mozzarella

Instructions
Grate butter into mixing bowl. Add flour and salt and combine well. Add water slowly until it looks like everything is sticking together but not not sticky; you might not need the full amount of water.
Knead a little until it holds firmly together in a ball. Flatten the ball a bit, put it back into the bowl and put in the refrigerator while you make the filling.

Heat the oven to 475°.

Make the filling: Whisk together the eggs, yogurt, milk and spices. Roll out the dough so that it's large enough to cover a 7-inch spring-form pan. Press it around all the bottom edge, and flatten the folds. Take off any overhanging dough (you can roll it out thinly and bake at the same time to make crackers; they may be done before the quiche is, so keep an eye on them if you do this). Sprinkle the kale, ham and cheese on top of the dough, then pour the filling over.

Put in the oven on a baking sheet and turn the heat down to 375. Cook for 20 minutes. The sides will slip down and it will look like a rustic tart. Take out of the oven and cool for at least 5 minutes.

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