Quiche with Hash-Brown Crust...

With a total of 7 new recipes coming out of our kitchen this week, our tops this round were the Caramel Cashew Cookies, that Farfalle with Cauliflower and Turkey Sausage dish and those Fig-Pecan Macaroons.

While I can certainly appreciate a flaky, buttery crust holding its own against an eggy quiche, there are times where you just want something a bit different... be it a crustless version or one with a rice crust. However, with this quiche we made tonight, we picked out a recipe that incorporated one of our favorite ingredients into the crust... potatoes!

For this Goat Cheese Quiche with Hash-Brown Crust, we took a pound of thawed, frozen shredded potatoes and squeezed as much of the excess liquid out as possible. Giving the potatoes a big squeeze now will help the crust crisp and firm up while baking, without having them turning to mush from steaming instead. The dry shreds are then tossed with a couple pats of softened butter and an egg to bind them all together. Dumped into a springform pan, the potato mixture is then press over the bottom and up the sides of the pan - if you find it wanting to stick to your fingers during this, moisten the bottom of a measuring up and use that to help spread the potatoes evenly.


You'll want to give the potatoes a head start to give them a little crust and create a seal to hold the upcoming egg mixture in. While the crust was busy in the oven, we started that egg filling by whisking together a cluster of eggs that we cut with a few egg whites. If you would rather skip the whites, replace the 6 egg whites is 3 whole eggs. To those, we added a few generous dollops of sour cream and soft goat cheese, along with the obligatory additions of salt and fresh ground black pepper. Poured into the unique potato crust, the filling is given a mild onion boost by scattering the top with shower of thinly sliced scallions.

Now, as you'll see in the recipe, to help unmold the quiche with a clean edge, we lined the sides of the springform pan with parchment paper - you don't have to do this, but it did make for an effortless release of the quiche. While I had faith in my crust that it was good to go, I would recommend placing the springform pan (which isn't water tight!) on a rimmed baking sheet just in case. Because the filling is fairly liquid-y, I know I'd be annoyed to find out that the springform pan started to leak and create a mess in the oven!

While both of us personally loved the tangy song this quiche exuded from the sour cream and most notably, the goat cheese, I do realize that it won't appeal to everyone. If you wanted a more welcoming-to-everyone type of dish, I wouldn't hesitate to delete the goat cheese in favor of an equal amount of a more mellow cream cheese. Soft in texture, but firm enough to hold clean slices, the pairing of the luscious filling and golden potato crust was quite enjoyable. Perfect to serve at warm or room temperature for a brunch, or as an attractive dish for a buffet, Jeff happened to mention while chowing down that he thought sneaking in some chopped ham or crispy bacon (especially if you opt for cream cheese) would be another way to add some personality and pizazz to this already tempting dish.

Recipes

Goat Cheese Quiche with Hash-Brown Crust