Mushroom, Spinach and Ham Tarts/Quiches

Submitted by I'mPat

"From a national chain supermarket as part of their Feed You Family for Under $10 - recipe created by Aussie Chef Curtis Stone. Have not included 1 1/2 hour chilling times for the pastry."

 

• Ready In: 1hr 20mins
• Ingredients: 14
• Yields: 4 tarts/quiches
• Serves: 4

ingredients

• Pastry Crust

• 177.44 ml plain flour
• 59.16 ml unsalted butter (chilled and cut into pieces)
• 44.37 ml water (chilled)
• 1.23 ml salt

• Filling

• 0 olive oil
• 100 g mushrooms (trimmed, cut into bite size pieces)
• 1 onion (coarsely chopped)
• 473.18 ml spinach leaves (if large coarsely chop, tightly packed)
• 50 g ham (chopped)
• 50 g cheese (tasty or cheddar grated)
• 118.29 ml thickened cream (double cream)
• 2 large eggs
• 2.46 ml salt
• 1.23 ml pepper (freshly ground)

directions

1. To make pastry crusts - combine flour, butter and salt in a food processor and blend until the mixture resembles bread crumbs.
2. Add 3 tablespoons of ice cold water and continue to blend until moist clumps begin to form.
3. Transfer the dough to a work surface and cut the dough into 4 pieces and flatten each piece into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.
4. Lightly coat four 6 1/2 diameter tart pans with removable bottoms with butter.
5. Unwrap the dough discs and roll out each disc on a lightly floured work surface to a 6 1/2 inch round.
6. Transfer the dough to the prepared tart pans, fold the overhang in and press gently to adhere.
7. Refrigerate for 30 minutes, or until the pastry shells are cold.
8. Preheat the oven to 200°C.
9. Line the pastry shells with foil and weight the foil down with pie weights or dried beans.
10. Place the tarts on a heavy baking tray and bake for 15 minutes.
11. Remove the weights and foil and return to the oven and bake for a further 8 minutes or until the crusts are pale golden in colour.
12. Meanwhile to prepare the filling - heat the oil in a large heavy pan over medium-high heat and add mushrooms and onion and saute for 3 minutes or until the mushrooms soften.
13. Add the spinach and saute for 1 minute or just until the spinach wilts.
14. Remove the pan from the heat and cool and the divide the mix among the 4 warm crusts.
15. Top each with an equal amount of ham and cheese.
16. Mix the cream, eggs, salt and pepper in a medium bowl to blend.
17. Divide the egg mix between the 4 tarts over the filling and bake for 18 minutes or until it is just set in the centre.
18. Cool for 5 minutes and then remove from and pans and you could serve with a salad if so inclined.

Reviews

[The Flying Chef]

Made these as part of a nibbles night at my house. I made 12 muffin size tarts along with 6 texas size muffin tarts. I increased the ingredients to get this and only made one ingredient add on and that was some garlic to the mushroom, onion and spinach mix. These were met with great delight as people were biting in and saying oohhh is that mushroom or yum spinach. Because making them as individual bites I made sure to layer everything real well so that each tart had a mix of all flavours. A great recipe Pat and one that was enjoyed by all especially my hubby who loved them and is so glad that I have 4 tarts left for him to reheat over the next couple of days. :)