Making Quiche

Owner/operators wear many hats, and over the 19 years here at Butter, I have worn all of the hats and played all the roles possible.  Mostly this means I'm here six days a week - 6:30 am to 6:30 pm (except my "short" Saturdays - 7 to 4 pm).  My seventh day (of rest) often includes work-from-the-home-office or becoming the shop "repairman," but it's still quite a change from pre-pandemic days when the cafe was open seven days a week and until 9 pm for six of them.   I tell anyone who asks what it's like to run a small business that it's not a full-time job - it's just a full-time lifestyle.

It must, of course, be said that I don't run this cafe solo.  I have 11 to 20 folks around me who are my team-mates.  We couldn't function without a baker/cook/barista team in place.  And on those rare days when one part of that team is completely missing - it's better to just be closed.

I was on the bakery team from January of 2006 to May of 2008, but since then have been able to let the bakers carry on without me, thanks to three amazing lead bakers - Amy, Susie, and now Rebecca.  I have hopped in for brief times during baker changes to take on a morning of scones and biscuits (much to my delight), but otherwise I save my pie dough skills for homebaking.

I think of myself mostly as that barista / counter guy who's here in both backup mode and on real barista shifts.  This fills a manager position that I dropped during the pandemic lock down and have yet to find a way to get back in place.  As the person at the counter, I also see myself as the intern trainer/supervisor for their three-month time with us.  

I have also played a kitchen role uninterrupted during the 19 years, mostly as prep cook and back up, but also taking the Saturday morning brunch role for extended periods, including a run from the fall of 2022 until this past summer.  Most recently the role has settled into a prep cook shift a day or two a week making quiche.  For a while, these days were on Sunday afternoons, but then I realized I was still working seven days a week and that was just a bit too much. 

However, on those quiet, closed Sundays, I formed a routine that let me speed through the whole process without interuption, without working around others, without worries about waiting for oven space.  I must admit that I often treated this like a challenge of the "Great British Bake-off."   Disclaimer: this was only possible because my bakers set me up with rolled quiche crusts ready to bake when I arrived (thank you bakers!). In the spirit of the show - I'd like to run you through the quiche process - judge me as you will.  Baker - you have two and one half hours.

Waiting on the ovens and flat top grill to pre-heat gives me time to get out my collection of ingredients and gather my tools much like I'd see the counters set up on the show.  Those 10 minutes set me up to flow from one activity to another.

We blind bake our shells (no filling - just pie shell weights) in a hot (375) convection oven using a high fan. After the first 20 minutes I remove the weights, dock the crusts (poking with a fork to allow steam to release), and then finish with 5 minutes (or so) at 325 to get fully-baked dry shells (because nobody likes a soggy bottom).

During par-baking time, I slice 4 large onions to carmelize on our grill for 20-30 minutes, and as they cook, slice shiitake and button mushrooms (70 or so!) for our veggie quiche to join the onions during the last 10 minutes of cooking.  I also put on a pot of salted water to blanch kale or broccoli or leeks (just 5 minutes) to go with some bacon or sausage. When all goes well, as the mushroom-onion mix is finishing and pulled off the grill, I can blanch my veggies and cook off the meat on the grill before I'm called by our oven timer to pull my pie shells out.

Then, with the shells getting a short rest to cool - I crack 42 eggs and whisk in 4 cups of heavy cream and 8 cups of whole milk (we are making 6 quiche after all).  I pull one quart of that egg-milk mix out of its big bucket and whisk a spice blend into it made of salt, white pepper and nutmeg.   This small spiced mix will be split among the 6 shells after I add their fillings.

The wild-card in this whole adventure is whether the blind-baking of the shells provides me with 6 lovely crusts, or, more likely, with some crusts that have shrunk below their rim or have cracked somewhere in the baking.  This becomes "pie dough band aid" time, tidying up the crusts with bits of saved pie dough - blending it into the warm crusts.  If all 6 crusts come out complete and "above the rim" - I do a little dance just to use up the patching time I would have used (another reason I like baking on the day we are closed).

With "happy" shells in place, I pull grated cheese from our cooler (thank you cooks for keeping grated cheese ready!) and cover the bottom of each shell.  Then I distribute the still-warm fillings and spiced-egg-milk mix, and my two trays are ready to make a trek to our conventional oven (at 400) to get filled with more egg mix.  I have learned that trying to carry a sheet tray with three fully filled shells is harder than it needs to be.  Once at the oven, I fill each quiche shell (mostly) - only filling them to the top of the rim after the sheet tray is on an oven rack and ready to slide in-oh-so-gently-and-smoothly. 

With both sheet trays in the oven (how did I do? bakers- you are half-way through), I set our kitchen timer (nicknamed HAL - for the helpful computer in Space Odyssey 2001) to one hour and start my clean up.  Which makes me think, contestants in the bake off don't wash dishes do they?

At the one-hour mark I do a jiggle test to assure the quiche is set - there is almost always a need for a little more time - and with a spin of the sheet trays so that front is back and back is front - and 5 to 10 minutes more, HAL will remind me that we have well-set quiche ready to come out and rest on our cooling racks.  Time is up - now for the judging...

This winter quiche routine changes once the growing season begins - with quiche becoming the landing spot for veggies as they come into season. First it's early greens and spinach, leading to summer squash and peppers, and on to tomatoes, and the late summer arrival of sweet corn.  Each bake offers a slightly different combination. As a member of three CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) Farms, their weekly boxes bring some surprises that are a joy despite my love of the winter quiche routine.

Passing this routine onto our cooks has been another of my joys, and i hope that passing it on to you may increase that joy. Walking alongside you on my green path of community building is one I look forward to with every quiche I bake.