As I didn’t have any gruyère cheese, I replaced it with parmesan. When I told my friend about it, the expression on her face was the same that an Italian would have, if someone told us that he put ketchup on his pasta (more about this here). Well, that being said, and having confessed to you my tiny little Italian detour of this French dish, I am sure that the mediterranealicious outcome makes it up :)

And last but not least.. There’s another Italian product that I used for this recipe: the ham. Same as the capocollo in my previous post, this one as well is a homemade product of my family back in Calabria, Italy.

Ingredients:

For the crust ‘pâte brisée’:

250 g / 8¾ oz of flour

125 g / 4½ oz of butter (soft)

70 ml / 2¼fl oz of lukewarm water

½ tsp of salt

For the filling:

200 g / 7 oz of crème fraîche

3 eggs

1 tbsp of grated parmesan cheese (or gruyère cheese if available)

a pinch of nutmeg

a pinch of salt & pepper

Flavors:

spinach & smoked salmon (add butter, herbs and spices)

olive oil-oregano marinated feta cheese & mint leaves

cherry or date tomatoes & ham

*  *  *  *  *

Take the butter out of the fridge at least 1 hour prior to making the dough.

Preheat the oven at 180°C / 356°F. Knead the flour, butter, salt and water to a smooth dough.

Grease the molds with butter. Roll out the dough as thin as a pie crust or a little thinner, in case the molds that you are using aren’t very deep. The dough should reach the edge of the mold. Make sure you don’t forget to dock it with a fork (that is making little holes into the dough, so that steam doesn’t build up underneath it while baking). Let them rest for about 30min. Then bake for 20min.

Filling: In the meantime whisk the crème fraîche with the eggs in a bowl. Stir in the cheese, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Set aside.

Depending on the topping flavors you have chosen, you need to consider enough tomatoes, spinach and so on, to cover the dough’s surface, once being put into the appropriate molds. Consider though not to fill them too much, as you need to add the egg mix on top!

Spinach-salmon: Melt some herb butter in a pan. You can also use plain butter and add herbs and spices, such as oregano, salt and pepper separately. Stir in the chopped spinach leaves and let them simmer for 2-3 min. Consider approx. 1 tbsp of spinach for a mini quiche mold. Lay approx. 1 tbsp of spinach on the crust, followed by thin slices of salmon.

Feta-mint: In a separate bowl, marinate the chopped feta cheese with a little (extra virgin) olive oil and oregano. Add the chopped mint leave and mix well. Put approx. 1 tbsp of feta-mint mix into the mold.

Tomato-ham: Alternate the tomato halves with thin slices of ham. 10min before taking them out of the oven you can add a few more ham slices on top.

Finally, pour the egg-crème fraîche mix on top of the toppings making sure that the edges of the crust are still visible.

Bake in the preheated oven at 200°C / 392°F for approx. 30-35min, until light golden brown. Let it cool down before serving.

Bon appétit!

Prep Time: 1,5h

Makes approx. 6-7 mini quiches