Quiche à Frigo Vide

1 deep-dish pie crust
6 eggs
1 splash (1/4 cup?) of milk or cream
1 pack bacon (approx. 10 slices)
6-8 oz. kale
1 handful fresh parsley
1 cup sharp cheddar cheese
1 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
dashes of thyme, nutmeg, and Cayenne

Pre-bake the pie crust at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes*. Cook the bacon and crumble. Chop up the kale and wilt it for a few minutes in a saucepan over low heat. Chop up the parsley. Whisk the eggs, milk/cream, and spices, making sure it gets a bit fluffy. After the things you cooked are cool**, add them, the parsley, and half of the cheese. Add it to the pie dish***, top with the rest of the cheese, and cook at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes, or until the egg sets. Let it cool for 5 minutes before cutting. Serve hot, cold, or at room temperature. Quiche is just awesome like that.

I love quiche. It seems fancy, but it’s just eggs and whatever’s in your fridge in a pie crust. It’s also a good way to sneak in some vegetables. I’m moving in a week or so, so I’m trying to just get rid of stuff, and the quiche willingly took all my extra food and made something delicious. Add or remove whatever you like: good additions are onion, tomato, spinach, chicken, leftover fish, etc. Use more cheese, if you like, but that’s all I had left.

*This is optional, but I feel like it keeps the bottom of the pie from getting mushy.

**Otherwise, you’ll cook the egg, and you don’t want to do that yet.

***You’re about to cook it anyway, so what does it matter if the hot pie crust gives it a head start?

Roast Chicken à Julia Child

1 2-3lb chicken
1 lemon
4 cloves garlic
a few tablespoons olive oil
2 sprigs rosemary
8 sprigs thyme (around 4x as much rosemary, that is)
salt
pepper
Cayenne
1 onion

a couple of tablespoons of flour
bourbon

Trim up your bird: take out the innards, wash the bird in warm water (You don’t want to stick something icy in the oven, or it won’t cook right.), and cut off any extra fat, if you like. Crush the garlic and put it in a big bowl. Slice a lemon in half, and squeeze out most of the juice; save the lemon halves. Chop up the rosemary and thyme, and throw in some salt and lots of black pepper and Cayenne. Rub this delightful stuff all over the bird, then let it hang out, breast-side down, while you chop up the onion and make a bed at the bottom of the roasting pan**. Salt and pepper the inside cavity of the chicken generously, then stuff in the lemon halves, garlic, and herbs. Place the chicken breast-side down in the oven, brush a little of the herb-y leftovers on the bird, and cook for about 20 minutes at 375. Flip the bird so the breast side is up, brush on the rest of the herbs, and cook for another 40-60 minutes, or until the juices run clear when you spear the breast or thigh*. Let the bird rest, and make a sauce from those drippings! Skim off as much fat as you can, and strain the drippings. Transfer a little bit to a saucepan and add the flour to make a kind-of roux. Add the rest of the drippings slowly (to avoid lumps), throw in a good splash of bourbon, and simmer. Season to taste, carve up the bird, and serve with lots of gravy and some of those onions, too, if you like. EDIT: Definitely with the onions. Soooo good!

*Cooking times are so dependent on your own oven, the size of the bird, how much stuff you put in the cavity, etc. There’s a meat thermometer temperature you should go for, too, but meat thermometers are for pansies. I thought I was good after an hour, but my oven is very inconsistent. I really miss my electric oven for that. I sliced in, all excited, and there was still a good inch of raw stuff in the breast. I cut the other side for even-ness and stuffed in some onion slices to keep it from getting too dry, then popped it back in for another 20 minutes. It *still* wasn’t done, so I stuffed the other checking slices with onions and did another 15, which worked perfectly. You probably won’t have to cook a 2-lb bird for an hour and 35 minutes . . . bringing the chicken to room temperature before cooking probably wouldn’t hurt either, though party with salmonella at your own risk.

**I used a disposable pan because I am one lazy chef, and I hate washing roasting pans. Also, my oven is tiiiiiiny.