A crowd pleaser. Buttery, flaky pie crust filled with a savory custard that’s loaded with ham, caramelized onions, blue cheese. This quiche is decadent, elegant and extremely addicting. Perfect for holiday parties and on-the-go breakfasts.
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There are endless parties between Christmas and New year, bet you gorgeous people are invited to a dozen yourselves. This recipe was inspired by the classic quiche loraine and the giant leftover ham in my fridge. I didn’t want to go to a friend’s party empty handed and wanted to make something that’s easy to eat yet still impress. Quiche is the perfect solution, especially if you have leftover pie crust in the fridge. If not, don’t worry this recipe’s got the delicious crust covered too.
I made my pie crust from scratch. I’ve got to say that I’m not an expert in pie crust making yet, but this crust is easy and perfectly buttery, flaky and delicious. You can use this recipe to make a 9″ quiche as well. I made the mini quiches bling baking without the pie weights, which worked but they weren’t perfect. The crust definitely needed the weights to blind bake so they don’t shrink and puff up and turn your quiches into a micro quiche. (This happened to mine as I was experimenting)
If you don’t have any pie weights and since we’re making mini quiches, you can also use bean or rice. Layer foil over your pie crust and load them up with beans or rice. Make sure you layer it with foil or parchment paper, or it will be a rather painful grain removal, I did it with rice once upon a time, not smart. It took me about 30 minutes to remove all the grains before I could start my next step.
The ratio of crust to filling for mini quiche is different than a regular quiche, the pie dough should be rolled thinner for a mini quiche. About 1/2 the thickness of a regular pie. I prefer the dowel type of rolling pin. It’s just easier to use and easier to control for me. I also find that rolling pins with measurements on the side to control my rolling evenly comes in handy. After rolling the pie dough out, I used a round cookie cutter to cut a round shape then layer them into a 12-cup regular muffin tin, patting them flat into each little tin.
As for the flavor of this quiche, it’s got layers of flavors. The fat of ham or bacon steeping into the egg custard, accompanied by the sweetness of caramelized onion. Biting into a crumb of creamy blue cheese that melts in your mouth, leaving a distinctly rich aroma combined with bits of ham and buttery flaky crust, it’s heavenly. Your guests will LOVE this dish, and they’re pretty to look at too.
OTHER CHRISTMAS LEFTOVER RECIPES YOU MIGHT LIKE:
TAIWANESE TURKEY AND RICE | 嘉義火雞肉飯
BACON CHEESE ROLL | 培根起司捲 (SUBSTITUTE BACON WITH HAM! IT’S VERY ADDICTING)
VEGETARIAN RADISH CAKE FROM SCRATCH | 自製米漿素食蘿蔔糕 (MAKE IT NON VEGETARIAN BY ADDING CHOPPED UP HAM, DRIED SHRIMP, FRIED SHALLOTS AND DRIED MUSHROOM SOAKED IN WATER AND DICED TO THE RECIPE. THAT’S THE KIND THEY SERVE AT THE DIMSUM RESTAURANTS!)
FRIED RICE WITH HAM (OR BACON) | 火腿炒飯
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Ingredients
Pie Crust
- 1 C all-purpose flour
- 2 TBsp all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1/2 TBsp Sugar
- 5 TBsp Butter Straight from the fridge
- 4 TBsp Ice Cold Water
Quiche Filling
- 2 Large Eggs
- 2/3 C Heavy cream
- 2 C Bacon or ham of your choice Chopped into small pieces
- 2 Small Onions Diced
- 1/3 C Blue Cheese Crumbles
- 2 tsp Paprika
- 1 tsp Freshly grounded black pepper
- Salt to taste
Instructions
Pie Dough
- In a small cup, fill it with ice and add water to create ice cold water for adding to the dough later. Set aside.
- In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar and salt, mix well.
- Cut the ice cold butter into small pieces, add to the flour mixture.
- Cut up the butter with a pastry blender or a fork, until the mixture looks like cornmeal.
- Scoop out ice water from the cup that was set aside earlier with a tablespoon, adding to the flour mixture one tablespoon at a time, mixing with a fork until 4 tablespoons are added.
- Press the dough together with your hands until you can form the dough into a ball, try not to knead or work the dough too much. Adding another tablespoon of ice water if necessary.
- Let the dough rest for 5 mins in the fridge.
- Roll the dough out to 1/6" (about 4mm) thick
- Using a cookie cutter or a mug that's 1.5 inch larger than the diameter of the muffin tin, cut out 12 rounds and lay them into the muffin tins, patting down to fit.
- Freeze the crust for 10 mins or refrigerate for 20.
- Pre-heat the oven to 425F
Pie Filling
- While the dough is chilling, make the filling. (OMG this rhymes)
- Cook the bacon until cooked and soft if using, remove from pan.
- Use the bacon fat or with 1 TBsp of butter, caramelize the chopped onion or medium high heat. Stirring constantly until the onions are browned but not burnt.
- Add 2 tsp paprika, 1tsp freshly grounded black pepper, salt to taste and cooked bacon or ham back to the pot and stir, remove from heat.
Blind Baking the Crust
- Take the chilled pie crust out of the fridge, layer them with pie weights or parchment paper/foil and beans or rice.
- Bake in the oven for 10 minutes to set, remove from oven. Remove pie weights from the crust.
- Turn the oven heat down to 375F
Filling and baking.
- Beat 2 large eggs, 2/3C heavy cream together and mix well.
- Fill each crust with the caramelized onion and ham filling and spoon the egg mixture into every cup, filling them 90% full and sprinkle blue cheese crumbles on top.
- Send the mini quiche back in the oven and bake for roughly 20 minutes until the custard has set and slightly browned. It's ok if it still jiggles a bit in the center.
- Remove from the muffin tins and let cool on a rack, serve warm or cold.
Notes
- Adding 2 more eggs, and 2/3C cream for the custard filling.
- Rolling the dough out to 2" larger than a 9" pie pan and set the dough in it instead of the muffin tin.
- Bake the filled quiche at 375 for 25-35 mins instead of 20.
