Cut the room temperature butter into 1 inch cubes and combine it lightly with the flour with your fingertips (or a food processor, using the 'pulse' button) until you have a crumb consistency.

Add a little of the water and start to press the crumbs together to form a dough in your bowl. Add more water but not too much. Massage the dough lightly, until you have one smooth ball of dough - but don't overwork it. Wrap the dough in a clean plastic bag and pop in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. Preheat your oven to 180ºC fan assisted / 200ºC / gas mark 6.

Lightly flour a clean work top and place your rested dough in the centre. Using a floured rolling pin, roll out the dough, turning it a quarter of a turn after each roll to create an even, circular sheet of pastry approx. 5mm in thickness. Add extra flour to the surface as you roll, to stop the dough from sticking. Cut around a saucer (or something similar) to create circles of pastry roughly the right size for a large 6 hole muffin tin.

Grease the tin very well with oil or butter (or use baking parchment) and carefully press the pastry circles into the tin. If you have excess pastry sticking out the top, gently cut it off. Gently press the seams of pastry together, ensuring it covers the tin and all gaps are sealed.

Blind bake your pastry before adding the filling. To do this, cut out sheets of baking parchment using the saucer as a template again, and cover each pastry case with it. Fill on top with baking beans or rice to weigh the paper down and keep the pastry flat, then pop this into the pre-heated oven for about 15 minutes, until the edges of the pastry are just starting to turn slightly golden. Remove the parchment and baking beans and pop back in the oven for a further 5 minutes just to dry out the inside base of the pastry case. Remove from oven, and set aside, whilst you make your filling.

Snap off the tough ends of the asparagus, then chop into bite size pieces. Drop into boiling water in a saucepan and simmer for 3 minutes, then drain and rinse under cold water to stop the asparagus over cooking. Top and tail the spring onions and finely chop, grate the cheese.

Evenly distribute the cooked asparagus, spring onion and grated cheese between the 6 pastry cases. Add a crunch of black pepper to each, and ensure the contents are nicely mixed up. Whisk the eggs and milk together thoroughly in a jug, then pour over the filling, allowing about 5mm space at the top.

Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until golden and set. Allow them to cool in the tin, then carefully ease out with a palate knife.

Serve our mini quiches to toddlers with a fresh salad or seasonal green vegetables. Younger children are often not keen on salad leaves, but it's worth continually trying them with a little. They may prefer some broccoli trees or green peas to start.

You may have a little dough left over, which can be frozen for next time!

To make frittatas instead, follow the mini quiche recipe, but put all of the ingredients straight into a well greased muffin tin without the pastry.