From Quinoa to Quiche. These are great Scrabble words, don't you think?

Remember that long list of vegetables I had on the Passover grocery list? Well, it's time to take them out of the fridge. I would suggest you save this recipe for the weekend. It's not a hard to do, it just took longer to prep everything than I expected. I started by taking every single ingredient out and laying it on the dining room table. I almost completely covered the table. Yep, that's a lot of goodness in one spot. I wish I took a picture of it, as it was a sight to behold!


For all of you CSA subscribers out there, this is a fantastic way to use your excess vegetables before your weekly box of produce arrives. In fact, I think my hubby should anticipate this as our Sunday brunch meal for the summer.


Doesn't this look pretty?








Vegetable Quiche from The Healthy Kitchen by Dr. Andrew Weil & Rosie Daley


Ingredients


1/2 cup purified water


1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes


1/2 pound asparagus (about 2 cups chopped) or broccoli florets


1/2 medium onion, chopped


2 cloves garlic, sliced


2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil


1 carrot, cut in small cubes (about 1 cup)


5 mushrooms, sliced


1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil, or 1 teaspoon dried


1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley


1/8 teaspoon chili flakes


1/8 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg


1/2 teaspoon salt


1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper


3 small red potatoes, washed and thinly sliced


1/2 cup grated cheese, Pepper Jack or Swiss


1/4 cup milk


1/2 cup low-fat sour cream


6 eggs


1 medium tomato, sliced (seeds squeezed out)


3 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Instructions
Preheat oven to 375º F. Boil the water, pour over the sun-dried tomatoes, and allow to soak for about 15 minutes until they become soft and plump. Strain off any remaining liquid, and coarsely chop.


Cut off about 1 inch of the coarse ends of the asparagus stalks and discard or save them for soup. Cut the remaining stalks into about 6 pieces or chop coarsely. (If you are using broccoli, cut into florets.) Blanch the asparagus by boiling it in a medium pot of water for 2 minutes or less. Asparagus should be bright green and firm to the bite. Drain, rinse the asparagus in cold water, and drain again in a colander.


Sauté the onions and the garlic in the olive oil over low heat until the onions are transparent, approximately 10 minutes. Add the carrots, mushrooms, basil, parsley, chili flakes, nutmeg, salt and pepper and continue to cook for 5 more minutes. Remove from the heat.


Lightly grease the bottom and sides of a 9-inch pie pan. Line the bottom with the potato slices, overlapping them slightly.


Whisk together the cheese, milk, sun-dried tomatoes, sour cream and the eggs in a large bowl. Mix in the sautéed vegetables and the blanched asparagus, coating everything with the cheese, milk and egg liquid, then pour into the potato-lined pie pan.


Arrange the tomato slices on top and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Bake for 1 hour, covering after 45 minutes if top browns. Completely baked quiche should be very firm. Let cool 15 minutes before slicing and serving.

• Purified water? I would like to tell you that I went down to the rambling stream by my house, paused to pet a deer and dipped my golden ladel in the water. But that didn't happen. I got it right from the tap.


• Instead of blanching my asparagus, I decided to steam it for 2 min. with a Glad Simply steaming bag. I didn't want to wash another pot!


• If I had this to do over, I would cut the carrots a little smaller and probably sauteed it a bit longer. Or maybe grating them would have been better? It was still a little too hard when I ate a piece of the quiche. Not bad at all, just inconsistent with the rest of the texture of the other veggies.


• I saved some time by purchasing sliced mushrooms. But I'm not going to kid you...this dish took about 40 minutes to prep. It was incredibly simple to put together, though. Oh, and did I mention it is really, really tasty? So please try it. Just do it on the weekend.


• To lighten it up a bit, I used three whole eggs and three egg whites. I also chose a lowfat Swiss cheese, but a full fat sour cream. Like Ellie Krieger, I prefer some things full fat, but in moderation.

Passover memory for today:

No one in my family can remember the year, so I'm going to say it's circa 1980. I was very young, possibly 6 years old. We are all gathered at my aunt and uncle's home for seder and there must be 25 people in attendance. The seder goes on as normal- no flaming hairdos to speak of- but one unusual thing did happen. It snowed. Alot. Actually, it was a blizzard. Now this is Philadelphia, mind you, in the Spring. By the end of the seder, no one could get their cars to budge an inch. We were snowed in. All 25 of us had one big sleepover.

Did I mention it was April Fool's Day? I know, I know, it sounds like a joke. But it really happened. I remember thinking my father should keep extra pillows in the car just in case this happens again.