Quiche Explained

Quiche
Name Lang:fr
Name Italics:true
Type:Tart
Main Ingredient:Pastry case filled with egg and cheese, meat, seafood, or vegetables

Quiche is a French tart consisting of a pastry crust filled with savoury custard and pieces of cheese, meat, seafood or vegetables. A well-known variant is quiche lorraine, which includes lardons or bacon. Quiche may be served hot, warm or cold.

Overview

Etymology

The word is first attested in French in 1805, and in 1605 in Lorrain patois. The first English usage — "quiche lorraine" — was recorded in 1925. The further etymology is uncertain, but it may be related to the German German: Kuchen meaning "cake" or "tart".[1]

History

Quiche is a French dish originating from the eastern part of the country. It may derive from an older preparation called féouse[2] typical in the city of Nancy in the 16th century. The early versions of quiche were made of bread dough but today shortcrust and puff pastry are used.[3] In 1586, They were served at a dinner for Charles III, Duke of Lorraine.[4] Before that, recipes for eggs and cream baked in pastry containing meat, fish and fruit are referred to as Crustardes of flesh and Crustade in the 14th-century The Forme of Cury.[5] Since the Middle Ages, there have been local preparations in Central Europe, from the east of France to Austria, that resemble quiche.[6]

The American writer and cookery teacher James Peterson recorded first encountering quiche in the late 1960s and being "convinced it was the most sophisticated and delicious thing [he had] ever tasted". He wrote that, by the 1980s, American quiches had begun to include ingredients he found "bizarre and unpleasant", such as broccoli, and that he regarded Bruce Feirstein's satirical book Real Men Don't Eat Quiche (1982) as the "final humiliation" of the dish, such that "[a] rugged and honest country dish had become a symbol of effete snobbery".[7]

Varieties

A quiche usually has a pastry crust and a filling of eggs with milk or cream or both. It may be made with vegetables, meat or seafood, and be served hot, warm or cold.[8] [9] Types of quiches include:

NameMain ingredientsRef
Quiche au CamembertCamembert cheese, cream, eggs[10]
Quiche aux champignonsMushrooms, cream, eggs[11]
Quiche aux endivesChicory, cream, eggs, cheese[12]
Quiche aux épinardsSpinach, cream, eggs
Quiche au fromage de GruyèreGruyère cheese, cream, eggs, bacon[13]
Quiche aux fromage blancCream cheese, cream, eggs, bacon[14]
Quiche aux fruits de merShrimp, crab or lobster, cream, eggs [15]
Quiche aux oignonsOnions, cream, eggs, cheese[16]
Quiche aux poireauxLeeks, cream, eggs, cheese
Quiche au RoquefortRoquefort cheese, cream, eggs
Quiche comtoise Comté cheese, cream, eggs, smoked bacon[17]
Quiche lorraineCream, eggs, bacon
Quiche niçoise, à la tomateAnchovies, olives, tomatoes, eggs, Parmesan cheese
In her French Country Cooking (1951), Elizabeth David gives a recipe for a quiche aux pommes de terre, in which the case is made not from shortcrust pastry but from mashed potato, flour and butter; the filling is cream, Gruyère and garlic.[18]

See also

References

Sources

Notes and References

  1. Encyclopedia: quiche . Oxford English Dictionary . OUP . 2015 . 4 February 2016 . subscription.
    - French: [http://www.cnrtl.fr/lexicographie/quiche "Quiche"], Centre Nationale de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales. Accessed 12 February 2015. This source also notes the first reference to 1805, in J.-J. Lionnois, Hist. des villes vieille et neuve de Nancy..., Nancy, t. 1, p. 80
  2. Book: Hamlyn . New Larousse Gastronomique . 2018-08-02 . Octopus . 978-0-600-63587-1.
  3. Web site: How to make a goat's cheese and herb quiche . Damien Pignolet . Gourmet Traveller . 13 June 2019.
  4. Book: Renauld, Jules Auteur du texte . Les hostelains et taverniers de Nancy : essai sur les moeurs épulaires de la Lorraine / par Jules Renauld,... . 1875.
  5. Book: Hieatt . Constance . Constance Bartlett Hieatt . Sharon . Butler . Curye on Inglysch: English culinary manuscripts of the fourteenth century (including the forme of cury . London . . SS . 8 . 1985.
  6. Book: Germershausen, Christian Friedrich . Die Hausmutter in allen ihren Geschäfften . 1782 . Junius . de.
  7. Peterson, p. 153
  8. David (2008), pp. 18 and 187
  9. Beck et al, p. 153
  10. Beck et al, p. 155
  11. Beck et al, p. 160
  12. Beck et al, p. 159
  13. Beck et al, p. 154
  14. David (2008), p. 187
  15. Beck et al, p. 156
  16. Beck et al, p. 157
  17. Montagné, p. 430
  18. David (1999), p. 285