Pointed Cabbage Quiche

In French cuisine, a quiche is a baked dish that is based on a custard made from eggs and milk or cream in a pastry crust. Usually, the pastry shell is blind baked before the other ingredients are added for a secondary baking period. Other ingredients such as cooked chopped meat, vegetables, or cheese are often added to the egg mixture before the quiche is baked. Although quiche is now a classic dish of French cuisine, quiche actually originated in Germany, in the medieval kingdom of Lothringen, under German rule, and which the French later renamed Lorraine. The word ‘quiche’ is from the German ‘Kuchen’, meaning cake.The original 'quiche Lorraine' was an open pie with a filling consisting of an egg and cream custard with smoked bacon or lardons. It was only later that cheese was added to the quiche Lorraine. The addition of Gruyère cheese makes a quiche au gruyère or a quiche vosgienne. The 'quiche alsacienne' is similar to the 'quiche Lorraine', though onions are added to the recipe. The bottom crust was originally made from bread dough, but that has since evolved into a short-crust or puff pastry crust. (source:wikipedia)


Well, enough history! Instead of the usual fish dish on Fridays, I decided to prepare something else for lunch. I found a forgotten pointed cabbage, I guess it was in the fridge for about 2 weeks... I also had some bacon, leek, some leftover short-crust pastry and a small piece of Vacherin Fribourgeois, that is one of my favourite cheese. So it was obivious that I am gonna bake a quiche.


Ingredients:
(pastry recipe adapted from Michel Roux)
250 g flour
150 g soft butter, cut into pieces
1 teaspoon salt
1 pinch of sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon cold milk
125 g bacon, cubed
250 g pointed cabbage
half a leek
fresh majoram
1 egg
200 ml cream
150 g cheese such as Gruyére, Emmentaler or Vacherin
salt, pepper, nutmeg

Put the flour in a large bowl and add the butter, salt, sugar and egg into the middle. Rub these ingredients togehter with your fingertips. Then rub the butter mixture into the flour until it resembles coarse breadcrums. Add the milk and knead a dough as fast as possible. Chill dough for an hour. The pastry can be kept in the fridge for a week or frozen for 3 months. For the filling fry bacon, as soon as it starts to brown add thin sliced leek and shredded cabbage and fry for 5-7 minutes, season and stir in the majoram, then let it cool. Preheat oven to 180°C. Roll out pastry about 2 mm thick and line 4 flan dishes. Line the base of the pastry with baking parchment and then fill it with baking beans and blind bake for 15 minutes. Remove the beans and parchment and return to the oven for another 5 minutes to cook the base. Let them cool. Mix the egg with the cream, season and pour it over the filling, sprinkle with grated cheese and bake for 15 minutes.