Purple Sprouting Broccoli Flan

With just under 200 grams of shortcrust flan pastry leftover from making the pea, mushroom and mint flan plus a generous harvest of purple sprouting broccoli from the allotment, I decided to use both in a second flan.

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The pastry was just enough to line a smaller oven dish, and I used the scraps to make one small individual flan too.

My rolling wasn’t too great (as I didn’t have Pete to do that for me this time!) but the pastry was soft enough to tear off bits from the overhang and use them to patch up the cracks and thin bits.

I didn’t weigh the broccoli, so I can’t give a complete recipe, but I made up the liquid mix using 170 ml double cream (based on the size of the pots my supermarket sells) and two eggs. Michel Roux’s mix for the pea, mushroom and mint flan uses one egg and two additional yolks, but I didn’t want to have more egg whites left over.

This post is really about encouraging you to make up your own flan recipe, using whatever vegetables you have to hand. If you’d like to make a larger flan just increase the amount of pastry, fillings and liquid accordingly.

Rough Recipe for Purple Sprouting Broccoli Flan

Ingredients
200 grams shortcrust flan pastry
Purple sprouting broccoli to fill flan dish
170 ml double cream
2 large eggs
Salt and pepper

Method

  • Preheat oven to 190 C.

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  • Roll out pastry and line your dish. Use offcuts from the edges to patch up cracks or thin areas.
  • Trim the edges, leaving a generous amount of pastry around the rim.
  • Line with baking paper and fill with baking beads.
  • Bake for 15 minutes, then remove from oven, take out baking beads and paper and bake for another 5 to 10 minutes, until pastry appears pale golden brown.

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  • Set aside to cool, leaving the oven on at 190 C.

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  • Optional: Chop off the thicker part of the stems from the purple sprouting broccoli and cook them in the microwave for 30 seconds to soften. If you do not have a microwave, you could steam for a couple of minutes instead.

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  • Line the bottom of the flan case with the stems, and cover with the broccoli florets.

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  • In a bowl, combine the double cream and eggs, season generously with salt and pepper and mix thoroughly.
  • Pour gently over the broccoli.

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  • Bake for 25 to 35 minutes until the surface shows some browning and a knife inserted into the flan comes out clean. Smaller individual flans will take less time than larger ones.

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  • Leave to cool for a few minutes before serving warm.

This was a delicious way to enjoy our home grown produce and use up leftover pastry and it’s definitely encouraged me to make more flans going forward. I’d always imagined I’d need to follow an exact recipe, but using my own estimates worked very well this time and has given me more confidence.

Please leave a comment - I love hearing from you!
6 Comments to "Purple Sprouting Broccoli Flan"

  1. kaveyeats

    Steve, quiche is French term for savoury custard-based tart. Flans can be sweet or savoury, also egg-based but I think the term is English, or has been part of English language longer. Maybe?

    Dom, heh, it might do! 😀

    Reply
  2. Tori (@eatori)

    Nothing like a little off piste cooking, seeing what will work. There’s a lovely recipe in Clotilde’s ‘Chocolate and Zucchini’ book for brocolli with apple in a flan- the apple gives it a lovely gentle sweetness (and there’s usually a slightly sad one languishing in my fruit bowl)

    Reply

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