Cheese and Onion Quiche

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •23cm loose-bottomed tart tin
• •Baking beans or dried rice (for blind baking)
• •Rolling pin
• •Wide, heavy-bottomed frying pan

Instructions

1. 1

   Make the pastry

   Put the flour and salt in a large bowl. Add the cold butter and rub it in with your fingertips until the mixture looks like coarse breadcrumbs. There should still be a few small, flat pieces of butter visible. That's what gives you a flaky crust. Add the egg yolk and a tablespoon of ice-cold water, then bring it together with a knife, adding the remaining water a little at a time until the dough just holds. Don't overwork it. The moment it comes together, stop. Wrap it in cling film, press it into a flat disc, and put it in the fridge for at least thirty minutes.

   Cold hands, cold butter, cold water. The colder everything stays, the better the pastry. If the kitchen is warm, put the flour in the fridge for twenty minutes beforehand.
2. 2

   Slow-cook the onions

   While the pastry rests, melt the butter in a wide, heavy pan over a low heat. Add the sliced onions and a good pinch of salt. Stir them through the butter, then turn the heat as low as it will go. Cook for twenty-five to thirty minutes, stirring every now and then, until they've gone from sharp and white to soft, golden, and almost jammy. They should smell sweet and faintly caramelised. If you've got thyme, stir it through in the last few minutes. Take them off the heat and let them cool.

   Don't be tempted to turn up the heat. Rushed onions brown on the outside and stay raw in the middle. The sweetness only comes with time and patience. This is where the flavour of the whole quiche is built.
3. 3

   Blind bake the case

   Set the oven to 200C/180C fan. Roll the pastry out on a lightly floured surface until it's large enough to line a 23cm loose-bottomed tart tin, with a little overhang. Lift it carefully into the tin and press it gently into the corners and up the sides. Don't trim the edges yet. Prick the base a few times with a fork, line with baking parchment, and fill with baking beans or dried rice. Bake for fifteen minutes, then remove the paper and beans and return to the oven for another five to eight minutes, until the base is dry and pale gold. If there are any small cracks, dab a little raw egg over them. They'll seal in the heat.

   Leave the pastry overhanging the tin until after blind baking. It shrinks as it cooks, and trimming before baking is how you end up with a case that's too short to hold the filling.
4. 4

   Build the filling

   Turn the oven down to 170C/150C fan. Spread the cooled onions across the base of the pastry case. Scatter over roughly two-thirds of the grated cheese. In a jug, beat the eggs with the cream and milk. Grate in a generous amount of nutmeg, more than you think, and season with salt and pepper. Pour the custard over the onions and cheese, letting it settle and find its way between the layers. Scatter the remaining cheese over the top.

5. 5

   Bake until just set

   Bake for twenty-five to thirty minutes. You're looking for the filling to be set at the edges but still with a gentle wobble in the centre when you give the tin a nudge. Not a liquid wobble. A just-barely-there tremble, like a custard that knows it's nearly done. The top should be golden in patches where the cheese has caught. Take it out and let it rest in the tin for at least ten minutes before trimming the pastry edges with a serrated knife and removing the sides. The filling firms as it cools, and cutting too soon will give you a flood rather than a slice.

   If the top is browning too quickly before the centre is set, lay a sheet of foil loosely over the top for the last ten minutes.

Chef Tips

• •The cheese makes or breaks this. Use a properly mature cheddar with some sharpness to it. Something you'd happily eat on its own with a cracker. If the cheese is boring, the quiche will be too.
• •Grate the nutmeg freshly and be more generous than feels comfortable. It should be present in the background of every bite, not dominant, but unmistakably there. Pre-ground nutmeg from a jar is a different substance altogether.
• •This is better at room temperature than straight from the oven. The flavours settle and the custard firms into something you can slice cleanly. If you're serving it for lunch, bake it in the morning and leave it to cool on the counter.
• •A quiche keeps well in the fridge for three days and needs nothing more than a salad beside it. It travels well too, which is why it turns up at every picnic worth the name.

Advance Preparation

• •The pastry can be made a day ahead and kept wrapped in the fridge. Bring it to cool room temperature for ten minutes before rolling.
• •The onions can be slow-cooked up to two days in advance and refrigerated. They improve with a day's rest.
• •The assembled quiche, once cooled, keeps in the fridge for up to three days. Bring to room temperature before serving, or warm through gently in a low oven for ten minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 180g)