This is one of my favorite recipes handed down from my Grandma. This leek quiche is perfect for a quick dinner or a lazy lunch with a light salad of morsels from the garden! I often make little versions for friends’ parties too! They can be either reheated after being frozen or they are scrummy cold too! Oh don’t forget the tomato chutney. Please.

ps. Down below I’ve popped a recipe for shortcrust pastry. But honestly sometimes it’s too much to muck around with all of that, so use some store bought puff pastry, or filo works a treat too. Make sure you layer the filo, and between each filo sheet paint on some melted butter. Do around 12ish sheets. You don’t have to blind bake the filo. But the puff pastry needs blind baking. So, butter the quiche dish and then line with puff pastry. Pop some baking paper on top of the puff pastry, place some rice or dried beans on top of the paper and bake in a 180 degree Celsius oven for 10 mins or until the pastry looks a little cooked and not raw.

Leek quiche

1 cup of grated cheese (combine Tasty, Parmesan, Jarlsberg, or even Feta)
4 rashes of free range bacon (optional)
3 eggs lightly beaten
3/4 cup of cream
2 leeks (or a few small ones if from your garden)
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
salt/pepper
sliced tomato

Slice – wash leeks and slice thinly – fry in a drizzle of olive oil until soft, set aside bowl.
Cut – bacon into about 1cm squares and fry in a drizzle of olive oil until a little brown, pop in bowl with leeks.
Add – cheese, cream, nutmeg, salt, pepper to bowl and lightly combine all ingredients.
Pour – into blind baked pastry.
Cook – in 210 degree Celsius oven for 10 mins and then reduce to a lower 170 degree Celsius oven for a further 30 mins.
The quiche should not be watery when cut into, so give a little more time in the oven if it is.

Shortcrust pastry

I add a little cheese to the pastry sometimes, but the addition of nutmeg is enough to give that extra little bit of flavour from ordinary pastry.

250g plain flour
100g butter
1 egg
nutmeg
bit of milk

Pop – flour and butter into bowl and rub together with finger and thumb to to make a kind of sandy crumble mixture. (Otherwise pulse with a food processor until the same consistency)
Add – egg and a touch of milk. Combine with your hands until all ingredients have just created a ball of dough. (You can pulse in the egg and milk in the food processor and then pat together on a floured surface)
Flour – lightly and wrap dough in plastic wrap and place in fridge for about half an hour.
Roll out – onto a floured surface to around 3 mil thick and place into lightly buttered quiche dish.

Blind bake shortcrust pastry:
Pop some baking paper on top of the short crust pastry, place some rice or dried beans on top of the paper to weigh down a little, and then bake in a 180 degree Celsius oven for 10 mins or until the pastry begins to look slightly cooked and not raw.