Cooking With Betty Crackpot: Quiche Lorraine

OK, so this is not a recipe you'd want to feed someone with a heart condition where arteries are an issue.  Thank God my arteries are fine, so I went ahead with this recipe, which I'd had my eye one for some time, as I am a huge fan of quiche, and this quiche in particular.  I made the crust from scratch, and while I was doing that, I thought Why don't I do this more often?  Making pie crust is no big deal, IMO.  I don't know why I don't do it more often.  Perhaps I will.

As far as sodium is concerned, well...I used low sodium bacon. I also used one cup of whipping cream and 1 cup of 1% milk instead of 2 cups of cream.  I omitted the salt and sugar.

Here is the recipe, from page 218 of the 1969 version of Betty Crocker's Cookbook.

Quiche Lorraine

Pastry for a 9" one crust pie
12 slices of bacon, crisply fried and crumbled
1 cup shredded Swiss cheese
1/3 cup minced onion
4 eggs
2 cups whipping cream or light cream (20%)
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp sugar
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

Heat oven to 425F.  Prepare pastry.  Sprinkle bacon, cheese, and onion in pastry-lined pan.  Beat eggs slightly; beat in remaining ingredients.  Pour cream mixture into pie pan.  Bake 15 minutes.

Reduce oven temperature to 300F and bake 30 minutes longer or until knife inserted 1" from the edge comes out clean.  Let stand 10 minutes before cutting.

A couple of issues.  First, the onions should be sauteed a bit because they gave off a lot of liquid during the cooking process and that made for a soggy crust. Also, I have no idea why the recipe instructs the cook to bake the quiche at 425F to begin with and then turn the temperature down.  I think this also contributed to a not-so-perfect crust bottom (pale and undercooked-looking).  So next time I make this, I'll cook down the onions a bit first and back the quiche at a one temperature...perhaps 350 or 375.  Also, I had to bake this way longer at 300 than the recipe suggests, like almost for an hour instead of 30 minutes.

Flavour-wise, however, this was great!  Loved it!  And I'll make it again for sure.  I served the quiche with some asparagus plainly roasted in a bit of olive oil.