Week 25: Egg and Cheese Pie, Again

The first veggies of the year were ready from the garden this week! That tiny tomato (an heirloom variety called Matina) was delicious. Hoping for lots more of those, that real tomato flavour is just impossible to get anywhere other than your own garden, unless you are willing to shell out the big bucks.

I forsee many tomato recipes in the future, but for now, I wanted to do something with the zucchini and the broccoli. So I decided to modify that Moosewood cauliflower cheese pie.

Egg and cheese and veggie pie:
I am really in love with this recipe, you can pretty much alter the fillings to suit whatever you have lying around. It's easy and delicious!

The crust is made of potatoes and, in this case, shredded zucchini. And a bit of salt mixed in. Toss with one beaten egg and a tablespoon or two of flour(you can also leave these out, this crust I actually forgot both the flour and the egg!). Grease a pie plate with butter, then line with the mixture (this is maybe 2 medium potatoes and a half a zucchini? you want to be generous, since the potatoes will shrink as they cook), bake at 425 or so for about 20 minutes. Brush lightly with olive oil and return to the oven for another 10 minutes or so to brown.

(anyone have any tips for how to get the potatoes to not turn kind of gray? I think it might have been the particular potatoes I was using, but next time I'm going to try tossing the shredded potatoes into cold water before I make up the mixture).

When the crust is nicely browned, shred cheddar cheese over top, and add in your veggies. You'll want to pre cook the veggies a bit, just to start them off and maybe get a bit of colour on them. This is garlic, broccoli, and zucchini lightly sauteed with some garlic. Onions are great in this, but I wanted to have a fighting chance of my kids eating this, so left them out.
Top with more cheese.
Pour in a mixture of eggs and milk. I used 4 eggs and maybe a scant quarter cup of milk. It's really guesswork, based on the size of your pan and how much you piled in the veggies!

Return to the oven and bake until the eggs are set:
About 25 minutes for this one. It was really yummy, and yes, the kids ate it! A slice of this makes a great lunch at work the next day, too. It also freezes pretty well, so worth doubling the recipe and putting one in the freezer.

Now I just need to solve the grey potato problem...