$re = '/=("?)\{([^}]+)\}\1/m';
$str = '={abc}
="{cde}
="{qwe}"
={123}"
={098
=777
=434 ';
$subst = "\2";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php