Quiche Lorraine

Rub 100 g of cold, diced butter into 200 g of flour and a pinch of salt with your fingertips, working quickly, until the mixture looks like coarse crumbs with a few pea-sized pieces left. Sprinkle over 60 ml of ice-cold water and mix with a knife until the crumbs begin to clump, then press them together into a disc without kneading. Wrap it and chill for at least 30 minutes. Warm, overworked pastry shrinks and turns tough in the oven.

• wheat flour200 g
• butter100 g
• water60 mL
• saltto taste

Heat the oven to 190 °C. Roll the pastry out on a floured surface to about 3 mm and lay it in a 24 cm tart tin with a removable base, pressing it into the corners and leaving the overhang in place. Prick the base with a fork, line it with baking paper and fill with dried beans or baking beads. Bake for 15 minutes, lift out the paper and beads, and bake for 5–8 minutes more, until the base is dry and pale gold. Trim the overhang flush with the rim and lower the oven to 180 °C.

Cut 200 g of streaky bacon, rind removed, into strips 1 cm wide to make lardons. Put them in a cold frying pan with no added fat over medium heat. Cook for 5–6 minutes, stirring now and then, until the fat has run and the pieces are lightly coloured at the edges but still tender, not crisp. They bake further in the tart. Lift them onto kitchen paper to drain. Leave the pan fat behind: a greasy filling splits and soaks into the base.

• bacon200 g

In a jug, whisk 4 eggs with 250 ml of cream and 150 ml of milk until the mixture is smooth and even in colour, but do not whip in air. Foam bakes into a spongy, bubbled top. Season with a pinch of grated nutmeg, plenty of black pepper and only a little salt, because the lardons are already salty and the cream mellows the seasoning once baked.

• egg4
• cream250 mL
• milk150 mL
• nutmeg1 pinch
• black pepperto taste
• saltto taste

Set the tart tin on a baking tray and scatter the drained lardons over the case. Slide the tray onto the oven shelf, then pour in the custard from the jug so nothing spills on the way. Bake at 180 °C for 30–35 minutes, until the custard has risen slightly, is lightly golden and just set, with a faint wobble in the very centre. Cool the quiche in the tin for at least 10 minutes before you unmould and cut it.

• bacon200 g