Caramelised Onion, Rosemary & Roasted Garlic Tofu Quiche with Olive Oil Pastry

Posted by thesensitivefoodie on November 27, 2013 in Dairy Free, Egg Free, Gluten Free, Nut Free, Vegetarian | 12 Comments

I had rather naively made the decision that I wouldn’t try to adapted versions of certain dishes that I figured couldn’t possibly be the same as their ‘normal’ counterparts. I saw recipes on vegan blogs and thought ‘they just think it’s good, because they don’t know any better”. Then a couple of weeks ago I parked next to a vegan cake shop called Green Choice in Newtown, walking in and seeing a display full of amazing looking cheesecakes, cakes and brownies, and I could eat pretty much all of them since most were also gluten free, was too good to pass up on, and even though I didn’t have high expectations, I got a slice of cheesecake, tropical cake and a brownie to take back to the office and try.  Now I can admit when I am wrong, and boy was I wrong….. they were absolutely amazing! And everyone that tried them were blown away by them. So I humbly apologise to the vegan bloggers that I doubted – you guys definitely do know better!

That got me thinking, one of the other things I had decided not to try making but had been really missing, was quiche. How could a quiche be a quiche, without egg, cream & cheese? With tofu, that’s how! My local bakery does a lovely caramelised onion & garlic quiche, that I used to love (but would feel pretty sick after), so that’s what I decided to have a go at replicating.

Pastry has always been one of those things that I could never be bothered making, not when I could just buy it, and save myself all the mess. But I figured that if I was going to make the quiche, I should do it properly from scratch, so decided to try making olive oil pastry. It didn’t work like normal pastry, without the gluten, it wouldn’t roll out properly. So I just did my best with it, and then filled in all the gaps and cracks with the left over bits, and pushed it in so it was smoothed out. I used mini size tins, because I though it might hold together better, but I think it would work just as well in a large tin. Once it was blind-baked and cooked, it held together perfectly and was lovely and crisp. It might have been messy and fiddly, but it by far the best gluten, dairy, egg free pastry I have had, and went perfectly with the quiche filling.

I am so happy that I can have quiche again, there was some happy dancing going on when I tried it. It doesn’t have the eggy , cheesy taste I’m used to, but texturally it was good, it held together well when sliced, tasted fantastic and you couldn’t taste tofu at all. Even my ‘can eat anything’ husband, enjoyed it, and said would happily have it again. Which is lucky, since I plan to make lots more!

Suitable for: gluten, dairy, egg, nut free and vegetarian/vegan diets

Ingredients – Pastry

• 250g gluten free plain flour (I used YesYouCan brand gluten free flour), or normal plain flour if not making GF.
• 1 teaspoons ground sea salt
• 1 chopped fresh rosemary
• 1 teaspoon dried onion powder
• 1/4 cup good quality olive oil
• 1/2 cup cold water

Ingredients – Filling

• 2 -3 large heads of garlic depending on how much garlic you like. I used 3, the garlic loses it’s strong flavour once roasted.
• 3 large red onions, halved and thinly sliced (seems like a lot, but it reduces right down)
• 1 & 1/2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary
• 1 teaspoons ground sea salt
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, plus extra to drizzle over garlic
• 400g silken firm tofu
• 1/4 cup soy milk, or milk of your choice
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• Optional – finely grated parmesan or pecorino cheese (I used sheeps milk pecorino), but leave this out if making completely dairy free or vegan)

Method (makes 1 large or 4 mini quiches)

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C degrees (350F). Grease quiche tins with olive oil.
2. Slice the top section of the garlic, so that the bulbs are exposed. Place on a baking tray and drizzle with olive oil. Roast for approx. one hour, or until golden. Allow to cool slightly, and then gently squeeze the bottom of the bulbs, so that the soft garlic oozes out.
3. In a large frypan, add the olive oil and the onion and mix well. Place over a medium/low heat for 30-40 minutes. Stirring occasionally, and adding a teaspoon of water every now and then as needed to stop it from drying out. It is ready once the onions have turned golden brown.  Stir through chopped rosemary and then remove from the heat and set aside.
4. In a mixing bowl, add the flour, 1 tspn chopped rosemary , onion powder & 1 tspn salt and mix well. Make a well in the middle and add the liquid ingredients. Using a fork, mix together until well combined, and then use your hands to knead into a dough. Let sit for 15 mins. Roll out the dough to fit your tins. Place into the tins and push in so that there is no gaps of cracks. Use extra bits of dough and press in to fill any gaps. Using a fork, stab the base of the tins a couple of times to prevent bubbles. Blind bake the pastry for 25 mins.
5. In a blender or processor (or with a stick mixer) combine the tofu, milk, remaining tspn salt, pepper and the roasted garlic that was removed in step 2.
6. Place the caramelised onion and rosemary mixture into the pastry shells. Pour over the tofu mixture until half filled, and then using a fork, stir through so that the onion isn’t stuck to the bottom. then pour over the remaining mixture until filled to just below the edges of the pastry. If using grated cheese, grate over the top, and then place into the oven for 40 mins or until cooked through.
7. Serve with salad greens, I used baby kale with caramelised balsamic vinegar drizzled over.

Recipe source: The quiche filling is my own recipe, the olive oil pastry was slightly adapted from Chocolate & Zucchini blog post

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