Coronation chicken is no longer the royal dish du jour.
Today’s monarch favours a spot of quiche, it seems, with Charles unveiling a broad bean and tarragon tart as the official recipe of his coronation.
Ahead of the big weekend, I’ve been tasked with making the King’s twist on a ‘classic’ – and I’ve realised I know very little about broad beans
What do they look like? Where are they in Sainos? Are they in a tin? Fresh? Can I use frozen?
So many questions. Then my mum – who is a very good cook – messages me to ensure I don’t forget to squeeze the beans. Er…. what?!
Oh and apparently, the same goes for the cooked spinach too.
Yes, these are two of the key ingredients in Charles’ quiche, along with a good heap of tarragon, lots of cheese (always good) and all the usual other bits and bobs you need to make a decent flan.
The recipe, posted to Charles and Camilla’s official social media accounts on Monday, gives a step-by-step guide to making said quiche, along with a video – I particularly love the bit where the chef delivers the spinach Salt Bae-style.
So after giving the recipe a read and a watch, I then head to the supermarket to get my royal quiche kit.
Thankfully, I have a well-stocked branch of Sainsburys and even in the evening there are heaps of fresh tarragon and spinach – and there may well be heaps of broad beans too, but I don’t know where to find them, and instead grab a bag of frozen ones.
I also make the executive decision to buy ready roll shortcrust pastry, as quite frankly, life is too short to make pastry from scratch unless your life depends on it.
Turns out that was a slight mistake. Maybe. The ready roll is oblong rather than square and no amount of rolling makes it the right shape so it will neatly cover a flan tin and then some – needed to make sure there’s enough to keep the edges nice and high (and the mixture in).
Either way, I manage to cobble it together and then blind bake, in the meantime microwaving the life out of my spinach and beans to make sure they are cooked and ready to roll.
I also have to make the liquid mix thing (the sauce?!) that gets poured all over the ingredients.
Cream, milk, eggs… bit of salt and pepper. Job done.
Then I chop the tarragon – and have a slight argument with my husband (who is actually doing the chopping, I can’t lie) about what constitutes a tablespoon.
We have a measure to make sure it’s right, but he prefers to measure by eye (to be fair he is the cook of the house). Of course, to me, it doesn’t look enough, so when I then insist on putting it into the measuring spoon to check, it’s the perfect amount. Annoying.
What’s also annoying is that when I check over the recipe, I realise that it says the herbs need to go in the sauce. But then they also need to go in with the spinach and beans. Which is it Charles? A basic cook like me, needs clear instruction! I decide on adding to the sauce – who knows if I’ve made a right royal error, only time will tell.
Once the beeper goes after 15 minutes, I take the pastry out and immediately understand why it’s quite important to line the tin with more than less pastry as mine has shrunk. Quite a lot.
Determined not to be beaten, I whack in half the cheese, the spinach (no Salt Bae style for me, I am so over this now), the beans – which, to be honest, look really bland and unappetising.
Then I pour in the mix. This is a perilous move given that the pastry doesn’t quite fill the tin, but I go with it and thankfully it doesn’t seem to spill too much over the edge (I think).
To finish I scatter on the rest of the cheese – and there’s loads, which I love, as I know that even if it does have an eclectic mix of ingredients, cheese always saves the day. Then I pop it back in the fridge for a final 25 minutes.
So… how did it go? Well, thankfully the excess mix didn’t spill out all over my oven. But even though it looks pretty decent – got a nice bit of brown on the top and seems to smell and look ok – half of the pastry is cooked decently on one side, but still a bit soft on the other from where the mix was trapped in the tin.
Of course, the big question is how did it taste…. Well, it had a bit of a soggy bottom (sorry Mary Berry), but it was ok. Not great, but okay.
The cheese, spinach and tarragon all worked – but the broad beans were a bit chunky and claggy, and totally not needed. I’d happily swap for a tomato or mushroom if I was to try the recipe again.
Of course, you don’t have to just take my word for it. The quiche was dutifully brought into the office here at Metro HQ, and my cooking abilities – and the royal recipe – was left open to scrutiny.
While some people were terribly kind and said it was nice, many of the reviews were, well, just okay. ‘As far as showstoppers go this certainly isn’t one of them,’ said one appraiser. ‘It’s a very inoffensive quiche – but, in my opinion, definitely not fit for a King.
‘I won’t be rushing out to make it myself, but there’s nothing truly horrific about it,’ surmised another. ‘Fine if you’re hungry.’
And as suspected, the beans were not a hit.
‘The large, suspiciously grey beans were a choice,’ said one writer. ‘The beans feel very unnecessary,’ added another.
However, others here at Metro HQ had some stronger notes for the King: ‘The food equivalent of getting caught in a grey, April drizzle: cold, unpleasant and out-of-place. A coronation deserves something more impactful than this drab, heartless mess.’ Say how you really feel.
‘My first thought was to puke,’ added an unhappy (and in my opinion, quite mean) news editor. ‘Without a crisp pastry, this quiche had the texture of custard. Throw in some broad beans, and it’s a recipe for a terrible lunch.’
So would I make it again? Not a chance. Would I eat it again? Only if there wasn’t any other quiche on offer.
If you’re a plant-based person this could be for you – but there’s probably a much better ready made one out there already with your name on (and if you could buy this rather than make it, it will probably be nicer!)
It’s a decent effort from our Charlie and a good nod to the type of King he is – plant-based, bit cheesy, sometimes confusing… but at the end of the day, does the job.
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