Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Almond milk quiche

My boyfriend introduced me to almond milk last year and I have to say, this stuff is amazing (see my post on making pudding with almond milk here). Almond milk is great for anyone who doesn't use enough milk to use it before it spoils. Almond milk will last unrefrigerated for months as long as you haven't opened it, so it's great to keep on hand for cooking. It will keep in the fridge for a few weeks after it's opened (I think the box says 10 days but we've kept it much longer without a problem).

For the most part, you can substitute almond milk for cow's milk in recipes but sometimes, it will change the taste of what you are making or the chemistry of using milk is important, so you have to be careful and maybe give it a trial run before you serve it at a dinner party or something. There are also lots of different types of almond milk - sweetened, unsweetened, vanilla - which you'll want to take into consideration when buying some to keep on hand. There are problems with this at my house because I will use a small amount for cooking and would prefer the unsweetened, unflavored but the person who ends up finishing it has different preferences when it comes to using it in coffee or on cereal...these are the issues of small household management.
Keeping this in mind, I wanted to make a quiche. Normally, I would use light cream (or maybe heavy mixed with a little milk, depending what was in the fridge) but this requires the purchase of dairy products, ergo advance planning. After a little online research, it seemed like making quiche with almond milk was possible so a I gave it a whirl, doing what I normally do but using almond milk instead (see my post about my first time making quiche (the standard cream way), a bacon-cheddar quiche here) .

This quiche turned out fluffy and delicious! If I hadn't told you I made it with almond milk, you never know the difference. Not only do I not have to make a trip to the store for cream, using almond milk instead of cream is much healthier. Enjoy!



To make a quiche with almond milk:
1 cup almond milk to every 4 eggs, ideally you want an unsweetened and plain (not vanilla) almond milk but I actually used a vanilla flavored one and we could not taste the difference.

The quiche shown above used:
9in pie plate
1 pre-made crust
5 eggs
1 1/4 cups almond milk
1 cup cheddar cheese
1 cup lightly sauteed mixed pepper strips (originally frozen)
6 strips chopped bacon
1 Tb Trader Joe's 21 seasoning salute (or other seasoning you like on eggs)
1/2 Tb of garlic salt (I was trying to counteract the vanilla flavor)

Baked 28 minutes at 350 degrees.
Update: Many people have commented that theirs takes much longer to cook. I have never had to bake one more than 35 minutes but there might be variation depending on your oven. I originally made this recipe with my electric oven at my previous house and it may have run hot, my current gas oven takes 33-35 minutes to bake at 350 degrees.

Different quiche recipes will call for different numbers of eggs, amounts of milk but honestly you will probably have to adjust depending on the depth of your pie plate and how much cheese/toppings you put in. It's pretty hard to screw up, don't be afraid because it has a fancy French name!


Update: after this worked the first time, I've made a bunch of quiches with almond milk. It's a great week night dinner for us. However, I tried coconut milk recently, because it was all we had and I expected it would work the same and it did not. The quiche was very rubbery and I won't be trying it again.

If you are looking for a Paleo option, try this frittata recipe.

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