What’s the History of Quiche?
Much of what we know about quiche hails from the 1938 encyclopaedia of gastronomy Larousse Gastronomique.
The French author and chef Prosper Montagné (1865-1948) edited the 1,000+ page first edition.
Larousse Gastronomique claims that quiche hails from Lorraine in Northeastern France.
However, there’s also the possibility quiche originated in Germany, before France made it its own. Lorraine
used to be the medieval kingdom of Bezirk Lothringen, which the French eventually occupied and renamed.
“Quiche” potentially derives from the German “kuchen”, which is a similar type of recipe.
The first mentioned of quiche dates back the 16th century, which muddles the exact origins of the dish.
Quiche Lorraine was one of the first variants from then—the cooking process involved baking a bread-dough casing that you’d expect with a pizza these days.
But over time the dish became characterised by its use of pastry, kind of like a pie. But not quite.
And according to various reports we researched, the dish stayed hidden away from most of France (and the wider world) until the 20th century.
After WWII it became popular in England. Then it started taking off in the
USA, USA, USA! in the 1950s.