OK, no cat-skinning, just the need find an alternative way to deal with a tricky bulb.\u00a0 It\u2019s Iron Chef night.\u00a0 This evening\u2019s ingredient is the now in-season artichoke<\/a>, a vegetable with which I have very little experience.\u00a0 So, before you start thinking that this is a post on the art of selecting, preparing, eating or even understanding this multi-layered beast of a treat, stop, and let me reiterate: this is a vegetable with which I have very little experience.<\/p>\n My contribution to our meal is a side dish.\u00a0 The thought of artichokes with bacon and garlic sounded tempting, so I decided upon a quiche.\u00a0 I will admit up front that I used canned artichoke hearts for this recipe, given everything else going on with it.\u00a0 Between prepping the crust, caramelizing onions (Walla Walla with a little brown sugar), and frying bacon to a crisp, I found myself looking for a shortcut.\u00a0 The artichokes \u2013 the central ingredient in this dish \u2013 were the path I decided to take.<\/p>\n I selected a can of quartered artichoke hearts that were packed with water.\u00a0 There was a bit of citric acid and salt in the mix, but no marinade or other preservatives.\u00a0 I drained the can, rinsed the artichoke pieces well, chopped them into \u00bd\u201d chunks, and then saut\u00e9ed them in olive oil with garlic and chopped spinach.\u00a0 The rest of the quiche came together fairly easily, particularly because I\u2019d made and frozen the pastry dough a week ago.<\/p>\n For the crust, I used a typical butter pastry recipe, replacing the wheat flour with a rice flour\/starch blend and using vegan butter.\u00a0 The keys to it coming together were using COLD ingredients, and including egg yolk, xanthan gum and cider vinegar for binding and texture.\u00a0 The resulting dough was refrigerated before I used it, so it held together well.\u00a0 Given my trial and error approach, I won\u2019t yet offer the recipe, but for inspiration, check out the MennoniteGirlsCanCook<\/a> and GlutenFreeGirl<\/a> blogs.<\/p>\n The recipe below is a composite of multiple dairy-based quiche recipes.\u00a0 I made substitutes galore to convert it to dairy-free, including upping the egg content to decrease the milk content, replacing milk with a combo of soy and rice milk, using vegan butter, and replacing the cheese with a non-dairy cream cheese substitute to maintain the intended richness of the traditional recipes.\u00a0 The result was tasty, if I do say so myself.<\/p>\n The bacon definitely adds flavor and texture to the quiche, but if you\u2019d like to make a vegetarian version of this recipe, simply leave it out.<\/p>\n