It's NYE 2008

Out with the old and in with the new. It's the last day of 2008.

Thinking back, this year has been pretty good. I've been gluten free for almost 2 years now, but the first year had a lot of cheating...it was so hard to break some of my food habits, but there's been no cheating this year.

I can remember 2 times when I know I ingested gluten, but it was definitely unintentional and I can remember hundreds of times I wished I could just snatch up one of those delicious cookies from the grocers bakery, but I was strong and didn't cheat.

I had been walking a road to vegetarianism for a long time and had been constantly decreasing the amount of meat in my diet to the point where I just decided it was time to make the switch. I've been meat free for 7 months. I found that switch much easier than the GF diet change.

Tonight is a New Years Eve party at my friends house and I will bring something. Of course wine. I have a bottle of Cab that we'll bring.

My aunt once told me of this super easy recipe for tartlette crusts that I think I remember and should make for an excellent mini quiche crusts so I'm giving it a try.

Mini Quiches!
Preheat overn to 350.

Crust
1 part margarine (1/2 cup)
1 part cream cheese (1/2 cup)
2 parts flour (1 cup your favorite Gluten Free flour that contains Xanthan Gum)
(I used 1/3 cup Arrowroot Flour, 1/3 cup corn flour, 1/3 cup Brown Rice flour, plus 1 tsp Xanthan Gum)

Soften margarine and cream cheese and mix thoroughly. Stir in the flour and cream together. Roll into 24 balls and press into bottoms and sides of mini muffin cups.

Filling
6 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/4 cup grated colby jack cheese

Sprinkle cheese into bottoms of mini crusts.

Beat eggs, milk, salt and pepper with mixer for 1 minute. Pour into crusts.

Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

I ended up with a little extra dough and filling so I pressed the dough into a large muffin cup and filled with the remaining cheese and eggs and baked it separately.

The crust is just perfect for these little quiches and would probably make for an excellent "full size" quiche crust too!

This was my first time making quiche and my first time making pie crust. I'm calling this a complete success.

EDIT: edited to add in all the pictures from the NYE Party at my friends house. See pics at my flickr set here.