The simplest broccoli and cheese pie, that only requires 4 ingredients and minimum hands-on time. This is my favourite recipe to use frozen broccoli. It’s always useful to have a bag or two of frozen veggies in the freezer, for those days you just don’t know what to eat and have run out of groceries. Add cheese, one egg, a pie crust and in the oven it goes. Simple and delicious.

This is an old recipe, one of the first ones I wrote on this blog. It is also one of the most recurring dinner options I used to make during my first year in Sweden. As some of you may know, I came to Sweden as a student, so I needed to be very careful with my money. Then winter came and the vegetable selection in the stores suddenly was a total ripoff. I was so used to finding good produce at reasonable prices back in Italy. But in Sweden in the winter nothing’s in season. And those sad veggies were not cheap, let me tell you. This is when I started to buy frozen.

Frozen vegetables are a surprisingly good alternative I was not used to buying. But as they say in Sweden, in the freezer section everything is always in season! And it’s true. I will not argue that fresh is better, but sometimes fresh is not the best option. Some other times, time might be an issue. Ran out of groceries and short on time to make yourself something to eat? This is when a packet of frozen veggies can save your dinner without spending money on delivery.

Frozen broccoli pie ingredients

I said 4 ingredients and I mean it. This might be the simplest pie you’ll ever made, and on that lazy evening when you still want to eat your veggies but in a delicious and effortless way you will thank my student dinners for coming up with this recipe.

For detailed quantities please refer to the recipe card below. Here come the instructions on how to make broccoli cheese pie the way I used to make it my first year in Sweden. I didn’t have a tart pan, didn’t have a rolling pin, but I did make my own pie crust. And I pressed it onto a springform pan, ’cause that’s all I had back then. The result was a fine tart with smooth edges, so I’ll keep the original design.

Step by step instructions

First up, take out a store-bought pie crust or make your own shortcrust. Roll it out with a rolling pin and then into a tart pan. If you do not have either, first roll some dough into a sausage and press it all around the edges of a springform pan. Then press down the rest of the dough all over the surface, flattening it down with your hands. To prevent having sides that are thicker than the bottom, press the handle of a fork (not the part with the prongs) against the sides to flatten it down. Prick the bottom and sides with a fork and set in the fridge to chill.

Cut the broccoli florets into small pieces and add to a bowl. Crack in the egg and mix it in with a fork until it is so well distributed that it virtually disappears. If working with defrosted or steamed broccoli, now it is time to add the salt – skip if your broccoli have been boiled in salty water. Lastly, fold in 3/4 of the grated cheese.

Transfer this mixture onto the pie crust and distribute over the whole surface. Sprinkle the rest of the cheese on the top and bake in the preheated oven at 180C (356F) for 35 minutes. I have also pressed the prongs of the fork along the edges to level the sides and make a small decoration.

Broccoli pie tips

If using frozen broccoli, make sure to defrost and drain from excess water. The weight of the broccoli in the recipe card is from frozen. Some water will go when defrosting, and that is negligible. In fact, I wasn’t always weighing my broccoli when making this recipe as a student, but a packet of frozen broccoli was 800 g so I stuck with it.

If using fresh florets, they need to be prepared by either boiling or steaming, then letting them cool down. If boiling, I recommend to use salted water to flavour the broccoli. In that case, there is no need to add the salt later, when making the pie filling.

There is no fixed cheese type to use, so the choice is really yours. Anything that melts nicely can work, for example gouda is a great choice.

Is this a quiche?

Technically speaking, this broccoli pie is not a quiche. A quiche is a savoury pie that is very similar to this one, but with one main difference: the filling consists of various vegetables or meats in a savoury custard. The ingredients of this savoury custard are most often eggs and cream, beaten together and poured over the other fillings in the pie crust.

In this broccoli pie we only have one egg, which together with the meted cheese binds together the broccoli bits. The texture is firmer than that of a quiche, that has a creamy filling. The other difference is also in the appearance of the unbaked pie: a quiche is quite runny and needs to set, while this pie is already quite solid and set. So this pie does not qualify as quiche.

For other veggie-first recipes, you may want to check out:

• Broccoli pasta bake
• Tomato pickled cauliflower
• Eggplant parmesan pizza
• Polish zapiekanka grilled sandwich

If you tried this recipe, let me know your thoughts in the comments. If you’re planning to try it another time, pin this recipe to Pinterest. Please consider subscribing to my newsletter and following me on Instagram and on Pinterest.

This post was originally published in August 2015 and has been updated in December 2025 with new pictures, better wording and a recipe card.