Roast pumpkin, ricotta and spinach quiche

Watching the Immunity challenge on All Stars I was surprised to see that I was present for the start of the challenge, but then vanished along with half the All Stars and half the professional chefs!  A huge thanks to Adrian Richardson for his graciousness and his assistance – he’s a top bloke.  Adrian made the mast beautiful salad of eggs and scampi which looked like a stroll through an elegant English garden.  Although we didn’t get to see the food critic’s comments of either of our dishes, I am sure they would have just adored his dish.  If you ever get the chance to go to Adrian’s restaurant, La Luna bistro, you should go.  It’s beautiful.

Anyway, despite apparently disappearing from the kitchen except in one glimpse where I appear to not have started cooking while everyone else has finished, I am pretty sure I was there because I definitely remember cooking a quiche.

Roast pumpkin, spinach and ricotta quiche

Serves 10-12
Prep time – 15 minutes Cooking time – 1 hr 30 minutes

For the pastry:

1 ½ cups plain flour
¼ tsp salt
125g well-chilled butter, cut into cubes
1 egg

For the filling:

Half a large butternut pumpkin  (750g)  cut into a 2cm dice
2/3 cup light olive oil (or vegetable oil)
½ teaspoon nutmeg
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
2 brown onions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
100g baby spinach
10 eggs
½ cup cream
1 cup grated tasty cheese or gruyere
40g parmesan, finely grated
250 fresh ricotta

Method

Preheat oven to 200ºC (180°C fan forced.)  Grease 26cm loose-based flan tin with butter or spray oil.

Place the ingredients into a food processor and process until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs and there are no lumps of butter.  With the blades running, add the egg and process further until  the dough comes together in a ball.

Turn the dough out of the food processor onto a cold surface.  Wrap the dough in plastic in a disc roughly 3cm thick, and rest it in the fridge for 15 minutes.

To roll out the dough, place it between two sheets of non-stick baking paper.  Roll very gently with a rolling pin.  It needs to be done quite slowly and gently so that it is being flattened, rather than stretched.  Rest it again before using.

Lay the pastry into the flan tin.  Leave the excess to overhang the sides of the tine – this will prevent any shrinkage.   Line with Glad bake and fill with pastry weights or rice.  Bake for 15 minutes or until starting to go golden.  Remove the paper and weights.  Set aside to cool while making the filling.

For the filling, toss the pumpkin cubes with oil, nutmeg, salt and pepper and roast in a baking tray for 30 minutes or until soft and golden brown.

In a frypan over a medium heat, sauté onions and garlic in 1 tablespoon olive oil

Take the pan off the heat and using tongs, toss the spinach through.  The spinach will wilt a little.

In a bowl, beat the eggs.  Add the cream and beat well.  Season with salt and pepper.

Remove the pumpkin from the oven and lower the temperature to 180ºC (160ºC fan forced).  Toss the pumpkin through the onion spinach mixture.  The spinach will wilt further.

Place half the mixture in the base of the pastry case.  Top with half of the tasty cheese and parmesan, then pour half the egg mixture over.  Shake the tin to make sure the egg sinks all around the vegetables.  Put the other half of the pumpkin on top and top with the remaining tasty and parmesan cheese and egg mixture.

Dollop the ricotta over the top, using a spoon burrow down a little so that there is some ricotta nestled inside the quiche as well.

Bake for 35 minutes or until golden brown on top and just firm in the middle.