Spicy Shrimp Quiche with Smoked Bacon, Pistou and Gluten Free Option

I love Sunday mornings when my husband and I can both sit at the table and enjoy rare free time with each other. We are busy people coming and going with his crazy work travel schedule and my blogger events/projects, of which I had four in four days last week.

If we find each other on a Sunday morning, it’s like peace, love, joy. Part of that joy is the cappuccino and brunch!

If I happen to have a well stocked refrigerator, it’s all the more joy, because it makes me feel like a chef, and gives me added inspiration to create food and share it with him and with you.

One of the blogging events included a Saturday food demo as part of a blogger weekend at Williams Sonoma called Bites and Blogs. The upscale Green Hills Mall in Nashville launched the pilot program for this, as seven bloggers were chosen to conduct various demos over the weekend, all unique and crowd pleasing, ranging from apple pie to french pastry to paella. If you want to know how to prepare for a cooking demo, I’m going to write that up and post that soon.

I chose to do a farmhouse salad and these strawberry and cream biscuits with basil.  Making biscuits in front of people at the best kitchen store in the world would have terrified me five years ago.  But when the upscale southern ladies described my biscuits as “divine” I breathed a sigh of relief and relished their southern speak. “These are davaahn.”

The best part of this past weekend was that a beautiful blogger, Callie Aldridge of Luv Cooks, offered to come and help me. She drove up from Birmingham Alabama, spent the night and devoted herself to getting up early, and making sure we had 60 biscuits and homemade buttermilk dressing ready to go. I just can’t thank her enough for bringing all of her energy and love for life right into the food experience.  (She’s hoping to move to Nashville, which excites me to no end).

Stars are people who desire to help others shine brighter with good intention, and she is just such a star!

The Spicy Shrimp and Bacon Quiche

My inspiration came from the ingredients I had left over. I used the smoked bacon, purchased from Porter Road Butcher  for the salad and that smokiness did this quiche well.  I was looking for the legendary Benton’s Bacon and discovered Porter Road makes their own great version.

I love to envision a dish in my head, try to virtually taste it and then see if it’s everything I fantasized about.

Do you ever do that? Do you ever dream up a dish in your head and get excited to get cooking? And, then get more excited because the person you made it for loves it in that “close your eyes” with each bite way?

This moment of joy is why I cook! I want to bring that sensual pleasure to others and I blog because I want you to bring it to your family too!

I was inspired to make the pistou, which pulled this together,  because I have a lot of basil in my garden, and I needed extra color.

Pistou is a Provencal condiment, made with basil and olive oil, often layered on top of a summer vegetable soup. (Another thing I want to jump into the kitchen and make for you right now).  It’s like a pesto without the cheese and pine nuts.

Spoon the pistou randomly in right before baking.

I only used 8 eggs because I wanted to add lots of shrimp. You can use more eggs, but add in a little more cream if you do that. Cream is God’s gift to the cooking kitchen, and I’m never without it.

Crust Options: Tart, Gluten Free, or Tortilla Crusted

I didn’t want to take the time to make this tart crust or this gluten free tart crust. Instead I did this quickly using used these raw flour tortillas from Tortilla Land the same way I did with this individual quiche. (You could also use corn tortillas for that gluten free option), or no crust at all for a crustless quiche (or frittata). I have used cooked tortillas in the past, and that’s certainly an option.

The End Result

Doug said it all, “I was disappointed to see you were making quiche, but I love every bite of this. The mix of flavors and ingredients is perfect, and I can’t stop eating it.”  Now I knew he didn’t like quiche, but I also knew he was going to feel very loved once he tried it.

I hope you feel the love today. I could just cook for myself, but I pull all of this together for you, my readers, because I care about helping you enjoy a rich life of pleasurable cooking and eating with your loved ones.

Please follow me on instagram, where you can be the first to see the food we make, eat and fuss over.

So tell me do you make quiche or do you do anything special on Sunday mornings?

Print Recipe

5 from 3 votes

Spicy Shrimp Quiche with Smoked Bacon, Pistou and Gluten Free Option

Spicy Shrimp and bacon quiche with Pistou, and a gluten free option

Prep Time30 minutes mins

Cook Time30 minutes mins

Total Time1 hour hr

Course: Brunch

Cuisine: American

Servings: 4

Author: Angela Roberts

Ingredients

• 4 slices smoked bacon such as Benton's bacon
• 1 tart crust or tortillas
• 8 eggs
• 1/3 cup cream
• 12 large shrimp
• 1 tablespoon Butt rub or your favorite rub like Slap Ya Mama
• 1/3 cup pistou
• 4 grape tomatoes
• 1/3 cup medium sharp white cheddar cheese
• salt pepper to season

Pistou

• 2 handfulls basil
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 1 clove garlic

Instructions

• Cut bacon into one inch pieces. Fry on medium heat until crispy. Remove with slotted spoon, drain on paper towel.
• Sprinkle shrimp with butt rub. You could also make a rub with paprika, cayenne to your liking. Or use a spicy rub of your choice.
• Fry shrimp in bacon grease about a minute on each side. Drain on paper towels.
• Prepare quiche pan with either this tart crust(see below for gluten free option) or tortillas.
• I cut the tortillas and overlapped to fit the quiche pan. Spray with non-stick spray first or grease pan with butter and flour to prevent sticking.
• Beat eggs and incorporate cream and salt and pepper.
• Add cheese to egg mixture.
• Place quiche pan onto a baking sheet. Wrap bottom and sides tightly with foil.
• Place tart crust onto pan. Or place tortillas in pan. You may need to cut and overlap a little, which is fine.
• Pour egg mixture into pan.
• Add shrimp, bacon, tomatoes.
• Spoon pistou into the egg mixture, randomly.

Pistou

• handfuls of fresh basil with stems removed
• /3 cup olive oil
• garlic clove, minced
• salt, pepper
• Using either mortar and pestle or mini food process, mix into a basil paste to the consistency of a pesto you will be able to spoon into the quiche mixture.
• Bake at 400 degrees F for 25-30 minutes.
• !Gluten Free Option can be found here.

Notes

This makes two to four serving sizes.

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If you love this recipe, please give it five stars. It means a lot. xoxo