Leftover Quiche

When cooking for a toddler it is very hard to figure out how much he or she is going to consume for that meal. Some days the little man picks at his food for a few mins before seeing how many times he can hit the dog with carefully aimed spoonfuls of whatever I've slaved in the kitchen to make for him.

For the last few days, The Little Man has been going through, what we think (hope), is a growth spurt. He's eating everything and anything you put in front of him. And when he's done he looks up with those big brown serious eyes and says "More, more, more, more?" (currently his favorite and most reliable word-meaning association).

So this weekend I've made some little snack sized quiches to tide him over between meals so he's not filling up on baby crackers and bananas.

The recipe is amended from one in the River Cottage Baby and Toddler Cookbook. I really like this cookbook because the recipes in it are meant for the whole family to enjoy and yet baby friendly so that the baby can eat what everyone else is eating. 

Essentially this is a quiche without pastry (because who keeps pastry around the house anyway). You can use almost any leftovers as fillers for the quiche. 

Gear

• 12 hole mini muffin silicone tray*
• frying pan

I don't actually own one of these. I have a regular sized muffin silicone tray. So I doubled the recipe and that made 11 regular muffin sized quiches. 

Ingredients:

Batter:

• 4 Eggs
• A couple of tbsp of milk or cream
• A small knob of butter (melted)

Filling:

• A bunch of spring onions (I didn't have any so I used 1 normal onion)
• A bit of olive oil (just to lubricate the frying pan)
• A couple of handfuls of spinach
• Whatever leftover stuff you think will go well. This could include flakes of fish, cooked ham, cooked chicken, bacon, etc. For this batch I used some leftover malay fried rice (Nasi Briyani), bacon, mushrooms.
• Shredded cheese

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
2. Cook the onions in a tiny bit of olive oil in a frying pan till soft.
3. Add the spinach and the leftovers and stir fry till the spinach is wilted.
4. Set aside to cool. (So it doesn't make scrambled eggs when you add it to the batter)
5. Lightly beat the eggs with the melted butter and milk or cream. You can add seasoning here but I didn't need it because I already had bacon in my mix.
6. Pour the egg mixture into the muffin mold (about 2/3 full)
7. Spoon your filling into the egg mixture
8. Top with shredded cheese.
9. Bake for 12-15 mins until puffy and top is golden brown. (tip: set the egg timer because they are easy to forget when kids are involved)
10.  Leave to cool before popping out of the muffin tray.

Serve warm or cold. The Little Man had 1 for dinner. The Little Man's Daddy had 2 for dinner and has swiped 2 for lunch tomorrow. The rest went into the fridge. 

To reheat, just pop them into the oven on low for about 10 mins. The good thing is that there is no pastry to get soggy here. So it reheats better than a traditional quiche. I would try to avoid reheating in a microwave.... I've never heard of any good experiences with microwaves and eggs.

Anyone have any other good recipes to share? I'm going to need ideas if this growth spurt keeps on going for another week. The Little Man polished off an entire punnet (150g) of blueberries while I was cooking this today.