Quiche

Recipe

• Shortcrust pastry - Claire Saffitz's Dessert person (parbaked) ^ With helpful tips from her YouTube video

• Bacon broccoli quiche filling - Kylee cooks

How it turned out

I made this for Mother's Day and it was a hit. It's the first time I've made a quiche where the filling was cooked right through and the crust wasn't burnt.

The layers were beautifully flaky thanks to Claire's recipe, which incorporates a fold into the dough-making process (see below). There was also minimal leakage, which meant the dough was crack-free.

What I learned

When doubling a recipe, don't do the math in your head. I did a double batch so I could have pie dough in the freezer ready to go next time I need it. I mentally doubled everything fine, except for the water. I couldn't figure out what I did wrong when the dough kept crumbling. Eventually, when I took it out of the fridge and incorporated more water, it clicked. Next time, I'm going to write out the recipe for a double batch in the cookbook to reduce my cognitive load and chance of error.

Make ahead. I've become a big proponent of preparing elements of bakes in advance and keeping them in the freezer for when I need them. It makes things feel far less rushed and less stressful on the day that I'm baking or assembling.

Seal the crust. Leaky filling is the enemy of quiche. After the first blind bake, I used an egg wash to seal the pie. To be extra safe, I also created a paste of water and flour to patch up any visible cracks before it went back into the oven.

Protect the crust. Because I normally burn the crust, this time I was very particular about protecting the edges with foil. After the first bake, when the foil and pie weights were removed (and after I did the sealing above), I put foil around the edges of the crust before it went back in the oven. This allowed me to remove the foil once the filling was added. It was a success — perfectly baked with no burnt crusts!