Quiche Lorraine

For the pastry

1. If you use ready-made pastry the preparation of a home-made quiche will only take half an hour or so, but is you prefer you can make up a batch in the morning and when you come home after a busy day it is ready for you. So if we start by making the pastry, first sieve the flour into a mixing bowl and chop some cold butter, straight from the fridge into it.
2. To mix it together you can use the fingertips, to get plenty of air through it, or if you are as lazy as I am, just put it in the bowl of a mixer and add the water as it slowly turns. Either way, just as it starts to bind together, you should knead it to form a ball. After that, cut it in two and put it in the fridge for at least an hour.

For the quiche

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/Gas 6.
2. Take the cold pastry from the fridge and roll it out ready to blind bake it, using the traditional method with baking beans or chick peas in a baking tin, and popping it in the oven for ten minutes or so. Remove the baking beans and baking paper. Reduce the oven to 180C/gas.
3. Once you have the basic mix of milk or cream and eggs mixed up together, you can add pretty much anything you fancy. The classic Quiche Lorraine uses ‘poitrine’, a type of smoked bacon, which is diced and briskly fried. While it is cooking, you mix the eggs and the extra yolk with milk or cream, depending how rich you want your quiche, and grate some cheese into it. I like a sharp cheese like gruyere in mine, but any cheese that suits the taste buds will work here. When the pastry is nicely browned, take it from the oven and scatter the bacon in and pour the egg mixture over it. Grind a little black pepper over the top and popular it back into the oven for a further twenty minutes or until the filling is set. There you have it – a lovely tasty and classic quiche, really fast and delicious.