Quiche was something I thoroughly enjoyed in pre-vegan days, and recently found myself pining for some. As I mentioned in my previous post, I am tofu-phobic. Actually, I said I wasn't a fan, which was a bit - ok a lot- of an understatement. Tofu is a great source of protein, but is also one of the most processed foods you can buy. Since eating more whole foods is my goal, I tend to avoid tofu. Plus, I have textural issues with it. So the search for tofu free vegan quiche began.
The great and arduous search took not time at all in this Pinterest day and age! Success! A tofu-free quiche base made with...garbanzo bean flour? Say what!?!? Since I started this vegan journey I have found many recipes with ingredients that initially made me take pause. In those cases I soldiered on, tried them, and did not regret it. In fact, I found many completely delicious dishes that blew my mind! When I first heard about cashew cream sauce I just didn't see anyway that could work, or be as good as people said, but it was!
Such is the case with this Vegan Quiche Filling Recipe from Chocolate & Zucchini. To make this I used a pre-made pie crust, and added onions, mushrooms, spinach, and shredded Chao Slices- Coconut Herb to the filling. I don't write/create recipes at this point because I generally have no idea how much of an ingredient I use. I adjust by taste when adding to/ad-libbing, and rarely measured. I'll just give a blow by blow of my experience trying this recipe. Firstly, I do know that one entire package of sliced cremini mushrooms were used, and I know for certain that it was an 8 ounce package.
Next are the onions. Since changing my way of eating, I find that I spend an exorbitant amount of time meal planning, prepping, and cooking. Don't get me wrong, I love it, but still look for ways I can take shortcuts here and there. One of my food prep shortcuts is using frozen chopped onions. Cutting raw onions is a real challenge for me. One, I am still knife skill challenged. Two, "Onions make me cry" is an understatement. There are times when I have to leave the room if someone else is chopping raw onion. When I am cutting onions myself, I definitely have to leave the room several times before finishing. Onion prep became something I dreaded, and was thrilled when I started using the frozen chopped onions. Tear-free cooking! Don't know why I didn't think of it sooner. But I digress. I threw "an appropriate amount" of frozen chopped onion. Really it all depends on how oniony you like it!
As for the Chao cheese I shredded about 1/4 of the block of cheese. I wasn't looking for extreme cheesiness, and I didn't really know how the shreds would work in a quiche. Prior to this my experience with the Chao slices only extended to them being melted on a burger, in a grilled cheese, or eaten straight out of the package. I've never added it shredded in a recipe before, and this was my first go with the Coconut Herb. If you haven't tried these yet, seriously, I can't recommend the Chao Slices highly enough! I have tried other vegan cheese and do use a couple in different recipes, but Chao is the only one so far that I could, would, and do eat right out of the package. I'm still hoping the only store in my area that sells it will the Tomato Cayenne variety. I've seen some very good reviews for it, and really want to try it. There are a number of vegan cheeses that you can buy, and many more that can be made at home. Keep trying to find what you do and don't like. My first taste of a store bought vegan cheese sent me flying right back to lacto-ovo vegetarianism swearing I'd never eat any vile vegan cheese again! But, I didn't give up. The sentiment "how can I live without cheese?!?!?" abounds with a lot of people who are thinking of changing to a vegan diet. The answers are "very well",and "healthier"! Oh yeah...back to the quiche....
I REALLY can't give you a measurement on how much spinach I used. Trying to determine how much raw spinach to add to a cooked dish is a huge guessing game for me, and I am usually woefully wrong. As I was preparing this post, I realized I never checked to see if I could find a raw to cooked spinach conversion, and not surprisingly I did. My Googlefu found that: "when a recipe calls for cooked fresh spinach, 1 pound of fresh spinach will yield 10-12 cups of torn leaves, which will cook down to about 1 cup". Well, now I know. A ton of fresh spinach equals a little bit of cooked spinach. Hmm.....knew THAT already, but now I can quantify it. For this quiche, near the end of sauteing the mushrooms and onions I added what I thought looked liked a good amount of spinach. Then added about twice that much more and it came out about right. I should have de-stemmed the spinach though. The stems are not very photogenic.
The ingredients for the chickpea flour/besan filling are(directly from Chocolate and Zucchini's site):
- 100 grams (1 cup) chickpea flour (available from natural foods stores and Indian markets, also labeled as gram flour or besan)
- 15 grams (1/4 cup) nutritional yeast (available from natural foods stores)
- 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
For detailed directions, as well as fantastically helpful photos for each step along the way click here. As for my Cliffs Notes version, mix all the above ingredients together and whisk in one cup of water. At this point in the process I tasted the batter and felt, for me, it needed a little oomph. In addition to the ingredients above I added some onion and garlic powder as those are my go to spices when I think a recipe "needs a little something" that isn't salt or an obvious other spice. Next, in a saucepan bring 1 1/2 cups of water to a simmer. Whisk in the chickpea flour mixture and bring back to a simmer. Cook over low heat stirring constantly for 5 - 8 minutes until thickened. Mix in the other filling ingredients of your choice, mine being the onion/mushroom/spinach/Chao slices. Pour into a par-baked pie crust and put in the oven at about 350 degrees (recipe indicates 360 degrees) for 25 minutes. The site also indicates the quiche should be taken out after 25 minutes, brushed with olive oil, and returned to the oven for another five minutes. This is a suggestion for aesthetics, as the olive oil gives the top a sheen as opposed to the matte finish it has without the oil.
Here's where we get to what at first was a heartbreaking point for me. Never having worked with chickpea flour, or a batter using it to make a quiche, I really wasn't sure how you could tell when it was done/set. At the 25 minute mark I took a piece of dry spaghetti and inserted it into the quiche to see if it would come out clean. It did not. Very battery. I continued to cook the quiche at 10 minute intervals and kept checking. It was getting closer but, not quite. Finally after 45+ minutes in the oven it seemed it just wasn't set totally in the center so I took it out. I then tested it again with the spaghetti on an angle, and it didn't come out clean anywhere ::::whomp whomp:::::. I thought maybe letting it sit for 10 minutes or so would firm it up. After 10 minutes I cut it, and it was not set. It wasn't I like had to eat it with a straw or spoon, but definitely not what it was supposed to be. Waited more time, still not set. I was about to toss the whole thing out then tasted it, and the gloppy quiche was delicious! I walked away, not having the heart at that moment to throw away the quiche after the work and time that was put into it. The mission at that moment was to find something else to eat for dinner. After that, I would deal with this disaster I had wrought unto the world. When I was done with dinner and came back to the quiche, I noticed that as more time passed it was slowly(VERY SLOWLY) setting more. Since it tasted so good, and it seemed there was progress, the decision was made to cut it into slices and put them in the refrigerator.
The next day I warmed up a slice of the quiche in the microwave. Fearing it might revert back to the gloppy state it was in the night before, I was careful not to overdo the reheating. To my pleasant surprise, it stayed completely set. The texture was great, and the taste was still delicious, if not more so! Since I was not going to be able to eat the entire quiche in a few days by myself, and no one else in my home will eat it. I froze several slices for another time. Again, being unfamiliar with some of these ingredients I'm not sure how it will fare. We shall see!
This is definitely a keeper, and something I will make again. Not sure why it took so long to set up. No one who commented on the recipe had this issue. Well, maybe one or two people, but at least one of them didn't cook it in the saucepan long enough. Perhaps I need to add more of the spinach, mushroom, onion filling. Maybe it was the cheese. Whatever it was remains a mystery. Next time I will tweak these items, and make sure to cook it the night before I plan to eat it. If you are a fan of quiche I highly recommend you give this a try!
