Les Poissonchats

Bölle, that means onions, and flade, that’s a quiche. Stinky sharp sweet onions that make you cry if you need it and induced my cousin to fetch his swimming goggles whenever he was asked to finely cut the onions, he liked to stick to his good mood at the expense of looking fabulously silly. 

Onion quiche, that’s a weekday thing, nothing fancy but warm and comfortable and at home. Besides, onions are super healthy and chase away bad stuff and very long ago, where I come from, folks used to make onion tresses and hung them in the gables of their houses and harm was kept from the farmstead, protecting the animals and the lands and the apple trees and every being within the onions’ confines. Very practical. 

Anyhow, this is how you bake a Bölleflade: 

What you’ll need

I like it best with puff pastry that I buy ready made from the traveling baker woman who stops at my door every second day. If I run out of my stock (I always keep some in the freezer), I make a plain pie crust myself.

For the dough

• 250g of spelt flour
• A pinch of salt
• 100g of fresh cold butter
• One egg

For the filling

• Four onions
• A spoon of flour
• A spoon of butter
• The tiniest sip of white wine
• One egg
• 0.5dl of cream
• 150g gruyere or otherwise fiery cheese
• Fleur de sel
• Pepper
• Nutmeg

How to bake it

The dough

Mix the flour with the salt and butter, the butter should not get warm, so you might just cut it with a knife into the flour or mix it in your kitchen robot. Swiftly incorporate the egg and form a ball. Cover in plastic foil and set aside in the fridge for at least another hour. 

The filling

Preheat the oven to 160°C with the fan. 

Cut the onions in thin slices and brown in a frying pan in butter for about ten minutes at medium temperature. Sprinkle with flour and add the wine, sizzle for another minute, then set aside. 

Mix the egg with the cream to a silky texture and add grated cheese, a whiff of nutmeg, pepper and fleur de sel. Add the onions. 

Rollout the dough and lay out a shallow quiche mould. Add the filling and bake golden for 40 minutes. 

Let sit for five minutes before serving. 

How to eat it

Extra vinegary carrot salad, that’s the perfect juicy winter thing to go with a Bölleflade.