One bite. Can I have a bite? A tiny bite. Yep, just a bite. Oh, that’s good. Yeah, no, that’s all I want. That was perfect.

Someone you know has a penchant for fast film cuts, for swift drinks before the hands of a happy hour clap shut, for skimming articles left open like milk containers on multiple tabs of a computer and for just minutes before squeezing in a run. Just a quick run, they promise you, but not before kissing you long and measured on the mouth, allaying that concern you carry of them ever.slowing.down. Someone you know prefers appetizers to entrees, their proclivity for picking off plates—maybe yours—leaving you either endeared or ready to end it. Oh, face it, you’re endeared. There is not enough time to feel ennui amongst the small plates of our small frying fish.

Someone you know just wants a taste, that spill of flavor, one bite.

Bites may not last, but they do stay with you.

My favorite bite comes in the form of a miniature zucchini and cheddar quiche. I have towed this recipe around like a child pulling the string of an antique dog pull toy, and one that I will not let go. These are the bites my nana served, the bites she had hot and waiting before coats could get wrapped around hangers; the bites my aunt served, the bites she took liberties with by changing cheese. They were my family’s go-to party appetizer and they were always, always a hit, disappearing like found money as we stared sadly at the serving basket of oil-stained cotton crocheted doilies.

With that in mind, at the height of my family’s miniature quiche popularity, I once threw an apartment party that was entirely intended to serve one thing and one thing alone. While I couldn’t promise heaven-made matches, I did lure my friends and friends of friends into my fourth-floor walk-up one bite at a time with the promise of everyone’s favorite miniature quiche never.going.away. Cute boys we once knew and the pretty girls that loved them keeping close to my oven, hoisted up on counters with skinny jeans crossed, getting lip gloss on wine glasses, caring not for tomorrow, but our eyes most certainly on twenty-something love and the trays after trays of miniature quiche that I carried with new mitts out into the noise and high of conversations both equally remembered and forgotten.

Whew.

Someone you know will be romantic for this recipe.

One bite. A tiny bite.

You’ll see.

Zucchini & Cheddar Miniature Quiche

Ingredients
(Yields 60)

• 4 cups medium zucchini, chopped small
• 1½ cup flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1½ tbsp. melted butter
• 1½ cups shredded cheddar
• 1 onion, chopped small
• ½ cup vegetable oil
• 3 eggs
• 2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. pepper
• 1 tsp. oregano

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and butter your mini muffin tins.
2. Mix all of the ingredients together.
3. Bake uncovered until golden brown, approximately 30 minutes.