Manly Quiche, a Brief History
They say that “real men don’t eat quiche” and it is true you don’t find it being served at strip clubs or Super Bowl parties. The best guess as to why quiche seems unmanly may have to do with the fact that so many quiches are vegetarian but now you can find them filled with any set of ingredients so the stigma has started to fade. That is good news for the quiche. It has been made in one form or another for a thousand years.
The history of this dish is more than a little confusing. Is it French (as most think) or is it German? The real answer is both. They started making quiche in Lothringen around 900-1100 A.D. and called it kuchen, German for cake. It was German at the time but the area went back and forth between Germany and France for the next thousand years. History buffs of the First World War will know that area as Alsace-Lorraine, were some of the heaviest fighting was. It is now the Provence of Lorraine (the capitol is Nancy) and the name is now given to quiche in its truest form, eggs, cream, and German smoked bacon. Gruyere was added later.
After the second World War it became popular England and finally hopped the pond in the late 1960’s as Americans started to experiment with old world cuisines. American taste and short cuts have altered quiche over the years but there are lots of options you can choose to make it your own. Here is an example.
Quiche Florentine
1 Sheet of puff pastry dough
1 bag of baby spinach, washed, dried, and chopped
1 cup of Swiss cheese (or gruyere)
4 slices of cooked bacon, grease reserved
¼ cup of minced onion
1.5 cups of half and half
3 eggs, room temperature
Salt and pepper to taste
Line pie dish with dough, trim to fit. Beat eggs. Bush top edge with egg, fold in half and half. In the bacon skillet, clarify onion then add spinach, adding grease as need. Work fast, the spinach just needs to wilt. Line crust with ½ the cheese, then spinach an onion, then crumpled or chopped bacon, then egg mixture, then top with remaining cheese. Bake at 350 till set, about an hour. Let rest for at least 10 minutes till slicing.
Bacon and ham are both common in quiche. You just heard about the bacon and its part in the history of quiche, but ham is common also. When made using ham, it is often paired with broccoli and/or mushrooms. Chicken is even used in some quiche but beef is almost unheard of.
Behind pork, seafood is the most common. It is almost always shellfish or mock crab. With seafood quiche, cream cheese is often used like below.
Seafood Quiche
1- 8″ unbaked pie shell
¼ cup chopped onion and celery (total)
4 ounces cream cheese
1/4 lb. Grated Swiss cheese
1/2 lb. Shrimp, shelled and deveined
2 Tbs. melted butter
3 large eggs
½ cup half and half
In butter, sauté onion/celery mix and shrimp. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs and half and half. In the bottom of the pie shell, place slices of cream cheese. Top with shrimp mix. Add Swiss cheese then top with egg mix. Bake at 375 till firmly set, about 45 minutes
