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I'd like to make a quiche this weekend (for the first time!), but I really want to reduce some of the fat and cholesterol due to health issues. Can I use an egg substitute (one of those that comes in a carton) instead of whole eggs in a quiche?

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  • Rumtscho commented below that much of the fat in a quiche is from the crust. I often make crustless quiche -- pour the mixture into a pyrex dish, and bake until the center is solid rather than liquid, which will take well over an hour at 350 F. That way, you can control the fat content even more.
    – Martha F.
    Apr 10, 2011 at 20:45
  • I used Egg Beaters to make the quiche in question - with a whole-wheat crust, low-fat cheese and using 1% milk. It came out great!
    – Alison S
    Apr 21, 2011 at 17:53

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Ener-G and Bob's makes an Egg replacer that is used as a substitute in many dishes. I have not tried it in quiche specifically but it works well in other baking applications (it's not an egg substitute like Egg-Beaters, which would be another substitute).

If your primary aim is to reduce the fat, you might consider just using the whites of the egg and adding more savory ingredients to supplement the loss of the yolk flavoring. The actual body of the quiche will not suffer (the structure is due to the whites); it might throw off the ratios of how much [egg] yields how much [cake]. Also, you can omit or substitute the cheese for low-fat options, change the crust to a less fattening one (use vegetable shortening as opposed to lard), substitute butter for Earth Balance, etc.

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I'm not really sure why you would want to bother making something that by definition is fatty when you are trying to avoid fatty foods. Egg substitutes simply don't have the same flavour or richness. So, yes, you could do that. It just won't taste recognizably like quiche.You may suffer from denser texture, also.

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    +1. First, daniel is right that both taste and texture will be very wrong. Second and probably more important, most fat in the quiche doesn't come from the 3-4 eggs, but from the 40% fat by weight you use in the crust. As you need saturated fat for that (unsaturated fat is liquid, almost impossible to use for a crust), its effect on blood cholesterol levels is also stronger than egg yolks. And don't forget the filling, it usually has cream, cheese or bacon.
    – rumtscho
    Apr 8, 2011 at 7:57
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Although I understand what Daniel is saying about it not tasting the same as a traditional quiche I disagree in that I think trying to look for alternative ways to have 'similar' recipes to those you need to avoid for health reasons is an excellent idea. I often cook a 'crustless' pizza in order to cut out the bread and you can do something similar to cut out the pastry of the quiche (as rumtscho said, this is the part that contains the most saturated fat). The recipes tend to require eggs, but you will be cutting out the pastry and it should have more of a 'quichey' taste. If you want to go even further and cut out the eggs you can use a vegan quiche recipe (although you will be compromising on the traditional taste).

An example of a crustless quiche that includes eggs is here- http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/1920/easy-mushroom-quiche.aspx

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    I make crustless quiche all the time, as I mentioned in my comment above. I just bake the filling in a Pyrex dish. Works wonderfully, and keeps well too. You can also lower fat by substituting some extra whites and low-fat cheese. I wouldn't look to eliminate all the fat, but you can experiment and find what works for you.
    – Martha F.
    Apr 10, 2011 at 20:47
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Not that I have made any, but I have eaten some - the Spanish make frittatas, which are like crustless quiche!

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/search.do?keywords=frittata

Perhaps you should look into that -

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    Frittatas aren't the same as quiche -- they are essentially baked scrambled eggs with fillings. Quiche involves mixing milk or cream into the eggs to get more of a custard-type taste and mouth-feel.
    – Martha F.
    Apr 10, 2011 at 20:48
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If you're really worried about fat and cholesterol, you shouldn't be eating quiche, period. You might be able to make something that's low in fat, but it won't be a quiche anymore.

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