Crustless quiche is everything you know and love about classic quiches – minus the carbs! While you can put almost anything in it, this ultra easy ham and cheese crustless quiche takes less than 5 minutes to get in the oven, and smells just like Quiche Lorraine.
Keeps perfectly for days, serve it as is, stuff into soft rolls or wraps, crispy burrito style!
Crustless Quiche
If you were to drop round on any given day, there’d likely be some version of crustless quiche in my fridge. This, along with Baked Frittata, are two of my most used fridge clean out recipes because they’re both terrific quick dump-and-bake recipes.
It does take 30 minutes or so to bake. But with pre chopped ham and a bag of shredded cheese, it takes less than 5 minutes to get into the oven – and it smells like a Quiche Lorraine when it’s baking!
Add to that the shelf life – it keeps perfectly for up to 5 days in the fridge. Serve it sliced like a quiche OR stuffed into soft rolls, or rolled up into flatbreads or tortillas then pan fried until crispy, burrito style. (Yes, I realise that defeats the “low carb” pitch for this recipe!😂)
What goes in Ham & Cheese Crustless Quiche
Here’s what you need for this quick ham and cheese quiche: eggs, cream OR milk, ham, cheese and green onions.
Cream vs Milk
Cream gives it a more luscious, custardy texture like everybody’s favourite Quiche Lorraine. Milk gives it a frittata texture – still quite custardy as long as you don’t overcook it, but it doesn’t have the same luxurious mouthfeel you can only get from cream!
If using milk, we need to reduce the amount of liquid used because eggs can’t hold as much milk as it can cream.
Use your adds ins of choice!
This recipe is more of a formula than actual recipe. Essentially, whisk together 5 eggs and 1 cup of cream OR 1/2 cup of milk, salt and pepper.
Then pour that into a greased pie tin with ~ 2 cups of whatever add-ins you want (I’ve used ham, cheese and green onions) and bake for 30 minutes until puffed and golden.
I do recommend that part of those 2 cups of add-ins includes cheese!
How to make Crustless Quiche
Here’s how I make Crustless Quiche:
Whisk together the eggs, cream or milk, salt and pepper;
Put most of the ham, cheese and green onions into a greased pie tin – we hold some back for topping so you get some bits on the surface which looks nice (love the golden cheese crust and browned bits of ham!);
Pour in all the egg mixture;
Scatter with remaining ham, cheese and onions;
Bake 30 – 35 minutes until golden and puffed;
Rest 5 minutes then slice!
Note: there is major deflation. So don’t get too excited when you see how puffy it is straight out of the oven. See?
But don’t worry. Deflation in height doesn’t result in deflation of tastiness! 😂
How I serve Crustless Quiche
Being the low-carb, easier sister of Quiche Lorraine, it would be a wonderful brunch option with a side salad – choose from this ever increasing collection of Vegetable Sides! For a very simple salad, toss any leafy greens or fresh raw vegetables with my Everyday Salad Dressing, and for a show off option, try this Leafy Apple Salad with Candied Walnuts or this Strawberry Spinach Salad (it is Fabulous with a capital “F”!).
But, as depicted and mentioned above, my favourite way is to make sandwiches and burritos out of crustless quiche. Or just piled on toast. It’s fabulously delicious, cheesy, salty and filling too. Big bonus that it keeps for 5 days and freezes fabulously! – Nagi x
Watch how to make it
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Crustless Quiche – Ham and Cheese
Ingredients
- 5 large eggs (~50 – 55g / 2oz each)
- 1 cup cream , heavy/thickened (halve if subbing milk, Note 1)
- 1/4 tsp salt (Note 2)
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 100g/ 3.5 oz ham , diced
- 1 cup shredded cheese (anything that melts except mozzarella, Note 3)
- 1 green onion , sliced
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180°C/350°F (160°C fan-forced). Grease a 22.5cm / 9" pie dish with butter or spray lightly with oil. (Note 4)
- Whisk eggs, cream, salt and pepper.
- Scatter most of the ham, cheese and green onion in the pie pan.
- Pour in egg mixture. Top with remaining ham, cheese and green onion.
- Bake 35 minutes until golden on top and centre barely wiggles. Don't overcook, it will lose custardy-ness.
- Remove from oven, rest 5 minutes and watch it deflate!
- Cut then serve with a simple side salad, or stuff into soft rolls, or wrap into burritos (then pan fry to crisp!)
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
More quiche and frittata type things
(With and without the carbs!)
Life of Dozer
Walk time. He isn’t subtle, is he??
And when he gave up waiting….
Totally agree Nagi this is more formula than recipe. I had leftover chicken & bacon in the fridge, added shallots from the garden, chilli, red onion + 1 tsp curry powder. It was really really good.
I totally agree. This is the best basic quiche recipe. I’ve made it many times and this time I added asparagus, little red peppers, scallions, ham and cheese and always she never disappoints.
Delicious, rich and creamy. I subbed out the ham and spring onion with fried good quality bacon and leeks. Reduced the cheese a bit (vintage cheddar) and no salt.
PS I often make a quick pie with just 6 whisked eggs, some fried bacon, cracked pepper, and a sheet of butter puff pastry. My son laughed when I said that Nagi’s crustless quiche avoided the fattening pastry, but replaced it with a carton of cream and a heap of cheese lol. It was worth it though!
Hi! I was wondering how I’d bake this in a 8inch/20cm cake tin? Alternatively I was thinking of using my 20cm square pan, but I can’t seem to get the slider to land on 7 eggs, I either get 6.67 or 7.5 eggs?
I made this today with steamed broccoli spears, chopped up, a can of drained red salmon, salted white onion and garlic and gruyere cheese. 4 whole eggs and 1 yolk, double cream as we refer to it in the UK, a generous sprinkle of ground black pepper. I put mine in a deep ceramic fluted flan dish and sat that in a larger less deep flan dish containing water, so bain Marie style, which was how I remember doing it a catering college decades ago.
I did cover the top for the last 10 mins to prevent over browning. Came out lovely. My husband loved it, unfortunately I can’t eat eggs because of a severe intolerance. Boy do I miss eggs 😒
I have just made this, but with fried onions and bacon – it is delicious!
I also made your potato salad which is brilliant.
Thanks Nagi X
I served above with a beetroot/lentil/mint/ yoghurt salad. YUM!
This crustless quiche is divine, Nagi! Whenever I buy quiche off a good bakery, I leave the crust anyway as it is non-flavourful carbs. I used 3 cheeses, Mersey Vale Crumbly cheddar, Gruyere, and Grana Padano and also a little red onion to go with the spring onion. Used Dollop cream and ended up with a delightful, fluffy, rich texture. Thank you!
Made this for Good Friday for a lawn bowls event. Varied the ingredients to make it vegetarian. Added roasted pumpkin, roasted zucchini, blanched spinach and oven-caramelised sliced onions. It was delicious. Being crustless was a bonus for the gluten free. It is a great recipe and so adaptable to whatever is in the fridge or to suit varied tastes. I served it with a relish. Delicious – thanks for a great recipe and a dish that can be useful to bring to any type of gathering.
Very tasty but similar to others, it was a little bit too salty for our tastes but would make again without the salt. I made it with grated lactose free cheese and used frozen sliced green onions (I can never use a whole bunch in one go and they freeze well if sliced up and stored in an airtight container for a couple of months).
I followed the instructions and got exactly the right amount. I feel like it was a bit salty. I probably wouldn’t even add salt next time
Wow! Just wow! Love this every time I make it! My baby says quiche all the time now…guess what he’s loving!! Thank you, thank you, thank you, Nagi! You are a gift, a tremendous gift!! Thank you too, Dozer! We love you!! <3
Winner. Foolproof. I will make this weekly with left over veg.
Wow! What an easy recipe! Didn’t have as much cream in the fridge as I thought, so I added a dash of full cream milk and it worked fine. I added fresh chopped habanero chilli from our tree, corn kernels and asparagus on top, as well as the ham, cheese and green onion. Looks and smells amazing! Just took it out of the oven. Can’t wait to try it! Yum!
Delish
This wasn’t good, it was absolutely dee-licious! Subbed 1 small onion fried with 3 strips of streaky bacon instead of ham and green onion. Didn’t have thick /heavy cream, used 3/4 cup of whipping cream instead. Served with spinach, roast pumpkin and feta salad. Very very tasty and ridiculously easy. Thanks for another winner NagiQ
So very good just as written. A friend just asked me to share the recipe as I treated her to it yesterday. Love, love love. Quick and easy and so tasty.
I made this quiche this morning for and I can say it’s the best quiche I’ve ever tasted. I love the texture too. I followed the recipe exactly, including all the cream, and added some chopped up sun dried tomatoes for some added flavour. This is the only quiche my husband has actually enjoyed. Thanks again Nagi xx
Made with 0 milks (7 egg) and regular white onion; plus I added mushrooms. Used Swiss and 8×8 square pan. Delicious lunch and breakfast tomorrow!
I just made this for the first time and used up leftover roast vegetables from Christmas Day. Can’t wait to try it and other recipes from your cookbook – gifted to my husband from me haha.
I made this for Christmas brunch. I had a 9.5 inch pan, so I used 4 large eggs and 1 jumbo egg, then upped the cream and cheese a bit. I used heavy cream and Trader Joe’s Unexpected Cheddar. I didn’t use ham. It was a huge success! The four of us ate every bite. Definitely a favorite that I will make when I have company for breakfast or brunch!
Thank you Nagi. This is a great on its own or to mix up with other ingredients. I also topped it up with mushrooms, spinach, plus garlic powder & cajun spice powder to the eggs & milk. Basically you could sub whatever your favourite ingredients are. 2nd time making this. Love quiche! 😋