Life is Good . . .

Indeed, it is. After a particularly ick Sunday (just not a happy outlook, no particular horror), the sun is out, and Monday has arrived. Add to that my replacement mattress was delivered this morning (yay! No more valley in the middle--gotta love those 10-year warranties), I baked a fresh loaf of wheat bread that has the house smelling lovely (my previous loaf, besides not raising, had started to grow grey fuzzies . . .), I have a miniature bacon/cheese/sun-dried tomato quiche in the oven for brunch, and a pear-yogurt smoothie at hand (along with my seventh cup of tea this morning!).

Now, my quiche today is a miniature one, made in a 5-inch pie shell, but I'll give the details for making a full-size (8 or 9 inch) pie. It is sooo incredibly easy!

Quiche
(inspired by/based on Julia Child's recipe in The French Chef cookbook)

3 large eggs
1 cup of milk (JC calls for whole milk or cream, I usually use skim because that's what I have)
1-2 cups grated cheese (I use Swiss when making a large one, but for my small one I used some Italian Four-Cheese blend I have on hand)
1/2 cooked bacon (I use Hormel bacon pieces that come in a bag--they are very lean and no mess!)
1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes
nutmeg to sprinkle generously over the top
salt and pepper to taste
1 9-inch pie crust (I used Pillsbury)

Preheat the oven to 375.

Spread the grated cheese over the bottom of the pie crust. Sprinkle the bacon and sun-dried tomatoes over that. Sprinkle on the nutmeg, salt, and pepper.

Whisk together the eggs and milk. I cheat and throw them all in my Magic Bullet blender for a few seconds! Pour the egg mixture over the other fillings in the pie crust.

Place in the pre-heated oven and bake for one hour. The quiche is done when the custard is well-set. It's hard to describe, but the filling should jiggle slightly when you shake the pan, but not slosh under the surface. Cool for a few minutes, then slice and serve.

Easy, no? When I make small ones like the one I'm having, I bake for thirty minutes, then check the status and add time, usually about fifteen minutes.

Notes: You can add just about any filling you want to this--I've put in all sorts of veggies, different cheeses, different meats, and different herbs. This can also be made without the crust, just pouring the filling into a well-greased dish.

P.S. I'll try to post pics later!

Today's Adventure: Changing the Bed

Sounds simple enough, right? I mean, how hard is it to change sheets. I wish it were as simple as that! I decided not just to change the sheets, but to change the mattresses as well. Wha? Why? when I built my house six years ago, I decided that rather than buy a cheap mattress/springs set for my spare bed, I would move my several-years-old, but still very good set that I had on my bed to the spare room and buy a new set for my bed. Everyone I talked to agreed it was a good idea.

So I went out and bought a luxury mattress--not just a pillow top, but a luxury pillow top. This mattress is so deep I had to get a special low-profile set of springs with it, and even then I needed a set of bed steps to get into my antique walnut bed (the bed is so high I have to rig two dust ruffles to reach from the frame to the floor!). One of my nieces said something about the Princess and the Pea--great analogy.

Skip ahead about four years. The luxury pillow top mattress, guaranteed never to develop a hole in the middle, did just that. Now, I come from a family that regularly turns their mattresses--just flipping side to side one time, over-end the next. This lessens the wear-and-tear on the mattress, and helps prevent the dreaded valley in the middle. With the luxury pillow-top, this isn't an option. Not only does it have a pillow top only on one side, the other side is just a papery backing, much like the bottom of a set of box springs. I could turn it around, bottom-to-top, but that was it, and the valley deepened.

Today, I got fed up. Instead of just changing sheets, I stripped both beds, pulled, pushed, and slid the mattresses across the house, and remade the beds. The spare bed is now ridiculously high (and the frame of it is so low you can't store anything under the bed), almost hiding the headboard, and my lovely Princess-and-the-Pea bed appears diminished. I even moved the bed steps away, as I don't need them. :( I figure I'll sleep better, plus I can look for another mattress to take the place of the luxury lemon.