Asparagus, Mushroom and Ham Quiche with a Potato Crust

There's a potluck tomorrow and "brunch" is the theme which means there will be lots of bread, fruit, and eggs. A specific request for an asparagus quiche and a desire to bring something that even celiacs can eat meant a hunt for a gluten-free recipe. Browsing around, I saw that a potato crust was fairly popular.

I liked the looks of this recipe but had to adapt. The size of the pie dish wasn't specified but 8 eggs were. That's a lot of eggs to fit into a pie dish - remember clafoutis? That was only 6 eggs, and sure there was a lot of cherries, but the lesson I learned there was that eggs puff up. A lot.

Alton Brown's Refrigerator Pie only uses two eggs along with a cup of cream to make the custard to fit in a standard 9" pie crust. So I opted to reduce the eggs and up the dairy and worked it into the 10" deep dish. Oh, and I skipped the halved grape tomatoes because, well, hot tomatoes.

Asparagus, Mushroom and Ham Quiche with a Potato Crust
adapted from For The Love of Cooking
click to print

1 Russet potato, thinly sliced
1 tsp olive oil
1/2 sweet yellow onion, diced
4 oz button mushrooms, sliced
1 c of ham, diced
5-6 asparagus spears, ends removed, cut into thirds
1/4 c Gruyere cheese, shredded
4 eggs, beaten
1 c heavy whipping cream
sea salt and freshly cracked pepper, to taste

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Spray a 10" deep dish pie plate with oil.


Layer the potato slices along the edges and bottom of dish ensuring they are overlapped. Bake 7-10 minutes or until potatoes just begin to soften. Remove from oven and set aside.


Heat the olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat.


Add the onions and mushrooms; season with sea salt. Saute 5-7 minutes or until tender and coming to a golden brown.

Meanwhile beat the eggs with the cream and season with sea salt and freshly cracked pepper, to taste.

Sprinkle mushroom mixture, ham, asparagus, and Gruyere cheese over the potatoes.


Slowly pour the egg mixture into the pie dish.


Bake 30-40 minutes or until a tester inserted in the center of the quiche comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool 15 minutes before serving. Or in my case, cool completely, cover and refrigerate.

I brought this quiche to work for the potluck and it was gone before I even got into the kitchen. Peeps were happy with it. One comment by email:

It was awesome!!! The potatoes were hard to scrape off the bowl but they weren’t burnt or too crispy. And I didn’t think the flavor was bland at all, it did have lots of good flavor. Oh, and it did kind of fall apart on me but it was still awesome (all two servings of it :)).

Ok, so I didn't lube the dish enough. And if you're concerned there needs to be more seasonings/herbs, you don't.

Cost:

• Russet potato: $0.42
• olive oil: $0.16
• sweet yellow onion: $0.25
• button mushrooms: $0.45
• asparagus spears: $1.63
• Gruyere cheese: $1.33
• eggs: $1.22
• heavy whipping cream: $0.98

Total: $6.44 or about $0.81 for each of 8 slices.

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