Category Archives: Cooking

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Healthy Mushroom and Shallot Quiche

Recovering from vacation . . . it’s painful. So I plan on telling you all about Alaska, but that day is not today. Today, I will drown my sorrows in food. Specifically, some good food.

My lovely friend Cassia has a lovely food blog. Granted, she hasn’t had much time recently to post since she’s entering her second year of graduate school and is up to her ears in books and papers and such, but that doesn’t stop me from gleaning delicious recipes from over yonder, such as this pasta, and now–this quiche.

Cassia made this quiche for our friend Jess Strickler’s baby shower last year. I remember thinking “Oh man! I’ve got to make this!” Then, a year went by. And here we are today, resurrecting the dreams of yesterday.

As you may have guessed by the title, this is not a cheesy, rich quiche (click here for that experience). It only has 4 eggs, a splash of milk, and no cheese. Hence the “healthy.” The real whammy from my perspective is: no half and half. No heavy cream. Let’s get this healthified fungi fest on the road!

Ingredients

(Serves 5)

2 TBS butter
1 1/2 lbs sliced mushrooms
6 cloves garlic
4 shallots
3 green onions
1 1/2 TBS fresh oregano leaves
2 tsp basil
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp dry mustard
4 eggs
3/4 cup 2% or whole milk
1 unbaked 9 inch frozen pie crust

Preheat the oven to 425 F. Pop in the frozen pie crust for 10 minutes.

When you remove it, it should be nice and golden all over.

Lower the temperature to 375 F.

Dice the shallots and garlic . . .

. . . slice the mushrooms (if they don’t come pre-sliced like mine), and chop up those green onions, for gosh’s sake!

Sorry, I had some bossiness urges that I had to get out there. If not, they fester and I become BossMan McMonsterPants. And I guarantee that’s not what my husband is looking for when he comes home after a long day on campus.

Melt the butter in a large skillet. When melted, add the mushrooms, garlic, shallots, green onions, and all the spices and seasonings.

I added the green onions a little later because I like ’em a little on the crispier side.

Don’t you love fresh oregano? This isn’t the first time that mushrooms and oregano have got together in my kitchen and shown the world they were meant for each other.

Cook over medium high to high heat, stirring occasionally, until all the mushroom liquid has evaporated.

Remove the mushrooms from the heat and let them cool completely. I was kind of in a hurry due to the rumblings of certain stomachs in the household, so I sped things up by Extending My Long Arm of Justice and placing the mushrooms in the freezer.

Break the eggs into a bowl and add the milk.

I’m sorry, heavy whipping cream. I’m sorry I abandoned you!

Whisk together the eggs and milk.

Once the mushrooms are cool, add them to the eggs.

 Stir to combine . . .

. . . then pour the mixture into the pie crust.

Beat yourself over the head because the innards don’t fit in the outtards.

Then stop beating yourself when you realize you can bake the remaining filling in an adorable red ramekin. Phew.

Bake the quiche for 40 minutes, or until puffy and starting to brown on top. Here’s the red ramekin-full, which I took out after about 30 minutes:

Let it sit for about 5 minutes before serving–this will allow it to set inside.

She’s a beaut, alright.

Serve with fresh oregano leaves sprinkled over top.

Next time I need to buy a bigger pie crust, because this one ended up simply too full–and I like a higher ratio of crust-to-innards.

See? Totally overstuffed.

But still delicious.

P.S. When we ate the leftovers the following night, the quiche was even better. This may be because I sprinkled all kinds of fresh Parmesan over the top before popping it in the oven to get hot.

“Healthy-schmealthy,” said my taste buds. Whoops. I think they learned that from me.

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Moroccan Mint Tea

Hi all! I am undoubtedly back from Alaska. Our first flight left yesterday evening, and our final flight was due to land in Chicago around 5am this morning . . . and somewhere in my squirrely little brain I decided that in order to maximize my vacation days, it made sense to go straight to work this very same morning.

This isn’t the first time I’ve done this. I know from experience that 5 gallons of coffee will be needed.

And until the 5 gallons of coffee actually take effect in my system, I figured I’d just share a little post that I wrote right before leaving. Because I’m probably in no shape to write at this exact moment. At this exact moment, I’m probably trying to prop my eyes open with toothpicks and apply my eyeliner in a straight-ish line to prepare for a lovely day at the office. During which I will need to remain coherent enough to catch up with everything and do a check run without bungling the entire bookeeping process.

But enough about that! Let’s get happy here–I now own a mint plant!

The story goes like this: we visited my aunt Jacquie while my cousin Will and his wife Kristen were there. Aunt Jacquie said “Do you want mint?” I cried “Yes!” So she went out to her garden and sent me home with a freshly dug-up plant and a small black and yellow spider that I spotted just before consuming the leaf he was on. That very night, I brewed up some Moroccan Mint Tea, and I rejoiced. Two days later, I realized that I had probably killed the plant. “I guess plants need water to survive,” I mused. I watered it. The plant kind of came back to life . . . on one side.

The jury’s still out on the livelihood of the other side.

I don’t know why it’s not thriving under my particular care–this other plant is doing great!

Oh yeah–that’s a plastic plant from Ikea.

Anyway, if you have a bunch of mint on hand, make some tea! Moroccan Mint Tea (at least the way I’ve had it) is very sweet–and of course very minty. It’s great served hot or cold, and it takes all of 5 minutes to brew up. We used to get big silver pots of it at a restaurant in Bloomington, Indiana called Casablanca. Sadly, Casablanca has since gone out of business, so this is my homage to their fabulous fare.

Ingredients

(Serves 5)

5 cups water
handful fresh mint (6-8 large sprigs)
5 tsp or 3 bags green tea
3 TBS sugar, to taste

For this batch I used decaf green tea, because tea is such a great calming drink to have before bedtime. However, in terms of taste, I much prefer this awesome loose leaf tea:

My friend Vessie gave it to me a long time ago, and I’m so glad I resurrected it for this purpose, because it’s absolutely delicious.

Add the mint and green tea to the pot . . .

. . . and the sugar, too.

If you are concerned about the level of sweetness (though this is meant to be a very sweet tea), err on the the side of caution and only use 1-2 TBS. You can add more sugar later as it steeps, when you can taste it.

Submerge everything with a spoon, and bring it to a boil.

Turn off the heat and let the tea steep for 3 minutes. Taste and add more sugar if needed.

Strain out the tea bags/leaves and mint, and toss ’em. We strain our tea through a funnel directly into a bottle for storage in the fridge:

As you can see, it’s kind of a two-person operation. But you can also just scoop out the solids if you don’t have an extra pair of mittened hands to help out.

The remains kind of look like a witches’ brew.

Serve hot, or store in the fridge to serve hot or cold at a later date. The tea is delicious both ways, but I like it best hot.

Mmmm. I also like drinking this tea with dinner.

It’s so fresh and heady.

Can’t wait to catch up on all your blogs!

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