Homemade Pie Crusts

Today was an awesomely rainy day - well, awesome for us, not so much for those that got flooded. We were woke up around 4am by some thunder-boomers, then after they passed it was just a good, hard rain, perfect for sleeping to.

I must have slept like a dead person...when I woke up again a few hours later, J was home and in the kitchen cooking breakfast.

After breakfast, he laid down for a nap, and I decided it would be a good day to work on another project in the kitchen: making ahead homemade pie crusts for freezing.

I have a recipe my Mom got from my Granny, who got it from I don't know where, but they always called it "Cheese Pie". I didn't learn until menia year later it's actually a ham and cheese Quiche.
Kev loves quiche, but I mostly stopped making it when me and J went (mostly) off gluten. I hadn't made it in awhile and Kev was asking me for it, but I didn't have any ham or pie crusts.

(It's coming up on Easter, I need to remember to get an extra ham when they're on sale for the Holiday for freezing for quiches and ham&beans and other eating for the next few months.)

I rode with Ryan to Walmart yesterday and remembered to grab a couple cans of cubed ham. Didn't buy any pie crusts because I protest how much they cost these days.

I looked up recipes for pie crusts on the internet, and they called for all-purpose flour. I only had a little bit of all-purpose flour, not enough, but what I did have was 50 pounds of self-rising flour I had stocked up on from Sam's. So I looked up recipes for pie crusts using self-rising flour, and about half said "Go ahead, I can't tell a difference", while the rest said "Don't do it".

Well, I did it, but I wasn't sure how they'd taste, if they'd taste too much like biscuits, or if the fam just wouldn't like them, so to start with I just made a couple of the quiches to try it out, see how they liked the crusts, before I made any more for freezing.

The pie crusts simply use: (Makes 1 crust)
1 cup self-rising flour
1/3 cup shortening
2 Tbsp Cold Water

Cut shortening into flour (with a pastry cutter thing, or I just use a fork, as my Home Ec teacher, Mrs. Lindley, taught us back in 1984. I believe that's the only thing I remember from that class) until crumbly.

Add water and mix until dough forms a ball.  Roll dough ball out on floured surface. I use wax paper.

I also flour the top of the dough ball and use a piece of wax paper on top, to roll out the crust between. I'm not too much of a germophobe, but I'm not sure where my rolling pin came from, or where it's been. I've washed it, but it still looks dirty to me, so I just don't want it touching my food.

Transfer the crust into your glass or tin (aluminum) pie plate/pan and either cut off the edges, or tuck them under. I flute around the edges with the fork tines.

To make the ham and cheese quiche:

2 (two) 5oz cans ham, or 8 - 10 oz cooked ham
4 eggs
8oz (2 cups) shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup of milk
salt & pepper

(You can also add sausage, spinach, broccoli, peppers, or anything else you like.)

Mix all together and pour into 2 pie shells. Bake at 350* for about 45 minutes. (I put mine on a cookie sheet because sometimes, just randomly, with no apparent rhyme or reason, they'll decide to run over.)

The guys approved, said it tasted like "regular crust" to them, so I went ahead and whipped up 6 more pie shells to put in the freezer.

They are really pretty quick and easy to just make fresh, but sometimes I'm just that lazy, that I just want to be able to reach in the freezer and pull out a crust already ready to go.

Otherwise today, I cleaned off the kitchen table and counter, washed the tablecloth along with a chenille bedspread, J and Kev got a spice rack built in the new kitchen, and they put up a new screen door on the carport door, so I can leave the house door open and be able to get some fresh Spring-time air.

It's suppose to be nice tomorrow, and get nicer all week. The weatherman said this weekend should be "Perfect", sunny and in the mid-70's. J happens to have this weekend off, so I'm very hopeful and excited that we'll be able to get the major plumbing part of the new kitchen done, and with that, we'll actually be just about all moved into the new kitchen.