Happy 2019 everyone!
I missed this community during the holiday break! I hope you all had a nice vacation. Did any of you bake? I baked plenty while my in-laws were visiting but I must have been too distracted, either from hosting or from all the French language, but all my bakes flopped! It was the weirdest thing:
- Mango Tart with Vanilla Bean Pastry Cream which is a tried and true recipe. However, I experimented with tapioca starch instead of cornstarch. It didn’t work. Good to know! :-p
- Mango Panna Cotta which still tasted delicious but I used a different type of gelatin which created a gelee that was both thicker and chewier than I wanted. Measuring here is key. 😉
- Pumpkin Carrot Cake which is always delicious. However, I used more pumpkin this time than the recipe calls for so I should have baked it longer due to the extra moisture. The entire center was under-baked so I scooped it out. It turned out beautifully…and donut shaped. If you add any more pumpkin or carrot, add a few more minutes baking time.
- Pumpkin Assorted Chocolate Chip Cookies I managed to do a fine job here with the batter, up until I wandered upstairs without my timer. The 10 minutes called for in the oven, turned into 35 minutes. I’ve never run so fast down the stairs in my life. I wasn’t fast enough though–whoopsies.
- Glazed Citrus Cream Cheese Cookies I probably make these cookies more often than anything else on my blog. Yet, while I was scooping the cookie dough onto the cookie sheets, I thought, hey, how come these are so dry? I’d forgotten the sugar! Even stirring the sugar in at the very end, couldn’t save them, they turned into little puddle cookies. Tee-hee.
After all these fails, I finally realized, perhaps a vacation should remain a vacation. So, Christmas morning, instead of baking a Cardamom Bread Wreath or Monkey Bread as is the tradition in my family, my mom took the reins and decided to make a quiche for a Christmas brunch (before we headed up to Big Basin to walk amongst the sequoias; great activity for international visitors by the way)!
This quiche is incredible. Even the French gave their stamp of approval. When I tasted it, I noted, a baking vacation was an excellent idea–why is it that anything your Mom makes always tastes better?! To ensure I wasn’t biased (from my baking vacation)–I remade the quiche and was relieved to find it was just as good if you’re making it for yourself. 🙂
It’s rich, full of flavor, and so easy to put together. I made my go-to buttery homemade crust, which added an element of sweetness that complimented the salty bacon and hearty greens nicely. There are neither onions nor garlic in the recipe, which I think says a lot about the power of the ingredients that are called for. It’s perfect for any occasion, great or small. While we had it for Christmas brunch, it can be super casual for a weekday lunch or dinner as well.
Enjoy!
A Bee Bakes 
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