Around My French Table (33 page)

Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium-low heat. Toss in the vegetables and cook, stirring, for about 10 minutes, or until they are tender. Season with salt and pepper, then scrape the vegetables into a bowl and let cool.

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Put the crust on a baking sheet lined with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.

Spoon the vegetables into the tart shell and spread them out—they will just about fill the crust. Whisk the cream, egg, and egg yolk together, season with salt and pepper, and carefully pour over the vegetables. Depending on how your crust baked, you may have too much custard—don't push it. Pour in as much custard as you can without it overflowing and wait a few minutes until it's settled into the crannies, then, if you think it will take it, pour in a little more. Very carefully slide the baking sheet into the oven. (If it's easier for you, put the quiche into the oven without the custard, then pour it in.)

Bake the quiche for 20 minutes. Sprinkle the cheese over the top and bake for another 5 to 10 minutes, or until the cheese is golden and, most important, the filling is uniformly puffed (wait for the center to puff), browned, and set. Transfer the quiche to a rack, remove the sides of the pan, and cool until it's only just warm or until it reaches room temperature before serving.

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

SERVING
If you're serving the quiche for lunch or as a starter to a light dinner, accompany it with a salad. If it's going to be a nibble with drinks, cut it into wedges that can be eaten as finger food.

STORING
Because this quiche is so good at room temperature, you can make it a few hours ahead and leave it out on the counter. Leftover quiche can be wrapped, refrigerated, and eaten the next day—either warm it briefly in the oven or let it come to room temperature.

I
WAS SURPRISED TO COME INTO THE KITCHEN
early one morning to find my husband happily having a leftover slice of this quiche for breakfast. But really, why not? It's got just about everything a spinach omelet would have—eggs, spinach, bacon, and cheese—and who wouldn't love that for breakfast? (Other than a Frenchman, who'd have a croissant to dunk into his coffee and call it quits.)

While this savory tart qualifies as a quiche, it's unlike most quiches in that cheese is not a primary ingredient. There's more filling than custard in this quiche, a somewhat more chockablock version of those served at lunchtime in the cafés of my Paris neighborhood, and more flavors—you'll catch smoky (the bacon), sweet (the onion and garlic), minerally (the spinach), and creamy (the custard).

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Put the tart shell on a baking sheet lined with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.

To cook the spinach, fit a steamer basket into a large pot. Pour in enough water to come almost up to the steamer, cover, and bring to a boil. Add the spinach, cover, and steam just until soft and thoroughly wilted, about 4 minutes. Remove the spinach, drain, and run under very cold water to cool it and set the color.

When the spinach is cool enough not to burn your hands, squeeze it between your palms to get out as much moisture as you can; do this in batches, so you can squeeze harder. Put the clumps of spinach on a cutting board and coarsely chop or thinly slice the spinach.

Put the bacon in a skillet, place the skillet over medium heat, and cook, turning occasionally, until the bacon is crisp on both sides. Transfer the bacon to a plate lined with paper towels to drain, and pat it dry (set the pan aside). Cut the bacon crosswise into thin strips.

Drain off all but 1 tablespoon of the fat from the skillet, return the skillet to medium heat, and toss in the onion and garlic. Season with salt and pepper and cook until soft but not at all colored, about 5 minutes; remove from the heat. Add the spinach and bacon bits to the pan, toss to blend, and add a little more salt and a few generous grindings of pepper.

Turn the spinach-onion mixture into the crust, spreading it as evenly as you can. Whisk the eggs and cream together until well blended and pour into the tart shell, giving the custard a minute to seep around the spinach and settle in. Sprinkle the top of the quiche with the Parmesan.

Carefully slide the baking sheet into the oven and bake for 30 to 40 minutes, or until the filling is uniformly puffed (wait for the center to puff), browned, and set. Transfer the quiche to a cooling rack, remove the sides of the pan, and allow it to cool and gather itself for at least 5 minutes or so before serving.

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

SERVING
Like many quiches, this one is excellent hot or only just warm and still very good at room temperature, so when you serve it is up to you.

STORING
Leftover quiche can be covered and kept in the refrigerator; bring to room temperature before serving. If your kitchen is cool, you can cover the quiche and keep it at room temperature overnight. Do that and, if you're like my husband, you might want to have a slice for breakfast.

M
USHROOMS AND SHALLOTS ARE A CLASSIC
combination and the base of the traditional finely chopped filling called
duxelles.
Here the combo is used to give a deep, earthy flavor to another classic, quiche. Plain white mushrooms make an excellent quiche, but if you use wild mushrooms, or a mix of wild and white, the dish will only be better.

Melt the butter in a large skillet, preferably one that's nonstick. Toss in the shallots, season with salt and pepper, and cook over medium-low heat, stirring, until translucent, about 2 minutes. Add the mushrooms, season again with salt and pepper, turn the heat up to high, and cook, stirring, until they are softened and browned, 5 to 8 minutes. The mushrooms will first sop up all the liquid in the pan, then they'll exude it, then it will disappear. Sprinkle the mushrooms with 1 tablespoon of the thyme and cook for 30 seconds more, then turn the mushrooms into a bowl to cool for at least 15 minutes.

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Put the crust on a baking sheet lined with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.

Sprinkle the remaining tablespoon of thyme over the bottom of the crust. Spoon over the mushrooms, avoiding any liquid that has accumulated in the bowl. Lightly beat the cream and eggs together just until well blended, season with salt and pepper, and pour over the mushrooms. Top the custard evenly with the sliced scallions and grated cheese.

Carefully slide the baking sheet into the oven and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until the custard is uniformly puffed (wait for the center to puff), lightly golden, and set. Transfer the quiche to a rack, remove the sides of the pan, and cool the quiche until it's only just warm or until it reaches room temperature before serving.

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

SERVING
You can pair the quiche with soup or salad or both, but it's also lovely on its own.

STORING
Although it is at its best warm or at room temperature the day it is made, the quiche can be kept in the fridge overnight. Bring it to room temperature or heat it briefly in a moderate oven before serving.

H
ERE'S AN INSTANCE OF A PROBLEM
averted and a recipe created. Friends were coming for dinner, and my plan had been to start the meal with peas, mushrooms, and poached eggs, but minutes before their arrival, I discovered that something had gone wrong with my peas (they were frozen and I'd defrosted them too far in advance). So the choice was: skip the appetizer or punt; I chose to punt. I might have chosen otherwise had I not caught a glimpse of some day-old brioche on the counter and thought about how lovely brioche is with mushrooms. Ten minutes later, I was serving toasted slices of the brioche alongside sauteed mushrooms and shallots, simmered with cream and topped with warm eggs, their yolks soft and runny. At the time, I had only white mushrooms on hand, but making the dish many times after, I confirmed what would be easy to guess: the dish is even tastier when you've got an assortment of mushrooms, some of them wild.

If you have large mushrooms, slice them a scant ¼ inch thick, then cut the slices crosswise in half. If you have smaller mushrooms, leave them whole or slice them in half. What you're looking for is bite-sized pieces—you don't want your guests to have to cut them to eat them.

Put a medium skillet over medium-high heat and add the butter and oil. When the bubbles from the butter have subsided, toss in the shallot and cook, stirring, until glistening and starting to soften, about 2 minutes. Add the mushrooms, season with salt and pepper, and cook, stirring often, until the mushrooms have given up their liquid. Continue cooking and stirring for another 2 minutes or so, until the mushrooms are tender, then pour in the cream. Bring the cream to a boil and cook for 3 minutes or so, until it thickens just a little, then pull the pan from the heat and stir in the rosemary and mint.

Arrange the brioche on salad plates and top with the mushrooms and then the eggs.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

SERVING
Place a slice of brioche on each of four salad plates, spoon the mushrooms and shallots over one corner of each slice—it's nice when the mushrooms and cream spill over the edges of the bread onto the center of the plate, and top each with an egg. You can poke the eggs, so that the yolk runs out, or you can leave that little bit of fun to your guests.

STORING
This dish should be made and served
à la minute
—there's no prep ahead of time (unless you make poached eggs) and no leftovers après.

W
HEN TOMATOES ARE IN SEASON,
the French are as determined as we are to find as many ways as possible to showcase their harvest. You see platters paved with overlapping circles of heirloom tomatoes dressed only with olive oil; tomato and mozzarella salads dotted with thick, syrupy balsamic vinegar; and tarts like these, which can stand alone as lunch.

Like Scallop and Onion Tartes Fines (
[>]
) and Fresh Tuna, Mozzarella, and Basil Pizza (
[>]
), these tartlets are built on a base of puff pastry that's been weighted down so that it bakes to a flat crisp. Slices of tomato and cheese—either mozzarella or goat—are spiraled over it. Invisible but providing a lot of flavor is an under layer of tapenade or pesto. Once the tartlets are assembled, you can serve them immediately or warm them very briefly. In either case, they're best finished with a little olive oil and some fresh basil leaves. If you'd like to make them more like a salad, you can drizzle them with balsamic.