Caramelized Onion & Blue Cheese Tart with a Whole Wheat Crust

I haven't really posted any savory items on this blog yet, but that would be wrong.  As unhealthy as all my desserts are, I'm a pretty healthy eater overall. I'm a vegetarian, I eat lots of fruit and veggies, and besides my sweets, I stick to whole grains as much as possible.

I wasn't always this way.  I remember well the days in college and early grad. school when I would become incredibly sleepy and lose all energy after every meal I ate.  These were the days when I would also regularly get a cheeseburger-without-the-meat (I've been a vegetarian since high school) and french fries at McDonald's.  Even when I wasn't eating junk food for lunch, I still ate things with white flour.  Then it was announced that McDonald's french fries are not vegetarian!  I was angry, of course, at the time, but it all worked out for the best, because I never went to McDonald's again after that.  At about the same time, I started eating pizza with whole grain crust for lunch a lot.  Then  I started eating exclusively whole grains for breakfast and lunch (and as much as possible for dinner as well).  Wow!  I was again a fountain of energy (ask my aerobics classes if you don't believe me), and life changed forever! 


Most whole grain breads still contain a large amount of white flour, often up to 50%, but this crust is made exclusively with whole wheat flour.  It's thin and crispy, and the caramelized onion and blue cheese pair very well.  I'll definitely be making it again.

Caramelized Onion & Blue Cheese Tart with A Whole Wheat Crust

(Adapted from Food and Wine)

For the Crust


1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, plus more for dusting
1/2 teaspoon salt
9 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch dice
1/4 cup cold water

As with most crusts, you can make it by hand or with a food processor.  If you're using the food processor (which I recommend if you haven't made a lot of pie crusts before), pulse the flour with 1/2 teaspoon of the salt. Add the diced butter and pulse until it’s the size of small peas or just a little larger. Sprinkle in the cold water and pulse again until the tart dough begins to come together. Turn the dough out onto a sheet of plastic wrap and pat it into a disk. Wrap the dough and refrigerate until it is firm, at least 1 hour. You can add more water if it's not coming together, but only add as much water as you absolutely need.  If there are a few crumbs that don't hold together, you're fine.


If you're doing it by hand, whisk together the flour and salt.  Add the diced butter, and use your fingers to work in the butter until it's the size of small peas.  Add the water, and stir it in with your hands, bringing the dough into a disk.  Wrap the dough in plastic wrap, and refrigerate until firm, at least 1 hour.

For the Filling

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 medium onions, halved and thinly sliced (about 1 1/2 pounds)
1 teaspoons thyme (dried)
Freshly ground pepper, to taste
3 ounces creamy blue cheese, crumbled (about 3/4 cup)

To Caramelize the Onions (you can do this in advance; refrigerate onions until ready to use)

In a large skillet, cook the onions and olive oil over low heat, stirring occasionally, until soft and  golden, about 30 minutes. Reduce the heat to low and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are golden, about 15 minutes longer.  Remove from the heat and let the onions cool to room temperature.

Preheat the oven to 400°F.


On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the dough to a 12-inch round. Wrap the dough around the rolling pin and transfer it to a 10-inch fluted tart pan (9" will work fine) with a removable bottom. Press the dough into the pan and trim off any excess (roll the rolling pin over the top, and the excess dough will just fall off). Use the scraps to patch any cracks. Prick holes all over the bottom of the crust with a fork. Bake until the crust is lightly browned, about 20 minutes.

 Pre-Baked Crust (it shrank quite a bit from the sides)

Spread the onions in the tart shell and sprinkle with the blue cheese, thyme, salt, and pepper. Bake until the cheese is melted and the onions are warm, about 5-8 minutes. Cut the tart into wedges and serve.

Berry Galette (Crostata)

My favorite restaurant in the world is Al Forno in Providence.  I went there as often as I could afford when I was in graduate school, and I try to go every time I get back to Providence (it's so popular, I once went there on Valentine's Day and was told there was a 5-hour wait!). The chef/owners at Al Forno invented grilled pizza; they serve an amazing baked pasta in pink sauce; the corn fritters alone in August make the 3 hour drive worth it.  The menu changes daily according to what's in season, and you have to order dessert at the same time as you order your meal.  Their signature dessert is their crostata - strawberries in the spring, apples in the winter, berries in the summer, and if you're very very lucky, white peach. Yumm....  This galette (i.e. crostata) uses the Al Forno dough, with a berry and lemon curd filling. If you're feeling extra indulgent, serve the galette in a pool of creme anglaise.

You'll have lots of extra lemon curd, but it tastes great with scones or fruit; or fold in some whipped cream for a light lemon mousse.  It lasts a few weeks in the fridge, and several months in the freezer.

My favorite thing about the galette:  it looks great (think rustic!), and is so much easier than a traditional pie.  So if you're scared of making pie dough from scratch, try this - you still have to roll it out, but no struggles to fit the dough perfectly into the pie plate and no fancy crimping required.

This was another recipe we covered in baking class.  Stay tuned for the students' final projects, they did great work!  Baked alaska, an orange and white chocolate Charlotte, Pierre Herme's plaisir sucre, macarons, Opera Cake, and so much more!! Pictures and recipes coming soon.

Brushing excess flour off dough

Gluten-Free Almond Tart

Last week I finished reading My Life in France Julia Child.  Although I had to shield my eyes during certain parts (every mention of bones crushing or blood gushing or really any too-in-depth meat discussion), it really was an inspirational book.  All I could think of was how much fun it would be to write a cookbook someday.  Now I've written a book before, a math book, and I never thought I'd be doing it again anytime too soon, but a cookbook seems much more exciting.  Julia was so scientific about all her recipe-tasting, much more so like a baker than a cook.  I'm constantly wishing I had the time and money to make certain recipes over and over again with slight tweaks and alterations here and there.  Just last night I made cupcakes out of my pumpkin bread recipe and spent a long time comparing that recipe with another recipe I have for pumpkin cupcakes.  It's still not fully clear to me how a quick bread recipe fundamentally differs from a cake recipe (in terms of ratios of flour to sugar and the amount of fat, etc); quick breads are typically both denser and drier than your average layer cake or cupcake, but there are very moist loaf cakes out there...  It's probably the mathematician in me, but I can't imagine a better way to spend an afternoon (or a whole week!) than finding a definitive answer to this question.  Plus, I really should have answers to questions like these when I teach my baking course in January.  So you should expect lots of fascinating investigative baking projects in the hopefully near future.  And maybe a book, but that's a long way off yet!


Currently I'm reading another book written by a professional chef, a pastry chef this time.  Now maybe I'm being overly harsh, having just finished Julia's book, but this current book irks me.  I don't expect a pastry chef to apologize for her abundant use of butter and eggs and cream, but there are a lot of great reasons to be a vegan, and doesn't a vegan deserve a tasty baked treat too?  I can understand that a pastry chef may decide not to offer any vegan goodies, but to be annoyed that someone would even dare ask about vegan options seems kind of ridiculous to me.  I'll post some of my vegan recipes soon, but in the meantime, here's a treat for the gluten-free folks out there who also deserve some tasty treats.

It's kind of a combination tart/frittata.  Except that I don't like frittatas (even though it's fun to say), and I like this.  It's not too heavy, and it has a great lemon flavor to it.  It's also great with homemade vanilla ice cream, though what isn't?

Recipe (from New York Times):

4 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup ground almonds
1/2 cup cream
1/2 cup sliced almonds, more for garnish
1 lemon, zest and juice
2 tablespoons butter
Powdered sugar, for garnish

Heat oven to 400F. In a bowl, combine eggs, sugar, salt, ground almonds, cream, sliced almonds, lemon zest, and juice. 

Melt butter in an 8-inch ovenproof skillet over low heat; when foam has subsided, add almond mixture to pan, tilting pan to distribute batter evenly. Continue to cook tart on stovetop until edges just begin to set, then put pan in oven and finish cooking, about 10 to 15 more minutes.

When tart is done, put it in broiler for about a minute or until just golden on top. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and sliced almonds. Serve.  It's great with vanilla ice cream!

Pastry Class at the Institute of Culinary Education - Part 1

Paris Brest

Ok, I messed up with the Daring Bakers again - but I have a great excuse this time. I took a 5-day pastry class at the Institute for Culinary Education in New York last week. It was so much fun! I'm usually all about cake, so pastry was definitely a great change of pace. We did pie dough, sweet tart dough, choux pastry, quick puff pastry, classic puff pastry, strudel dough, phyllo dough. We didn't do anything with yeast, but they do have a 2-day Brioche and Croissants class which is mighty tempting.

I highly recommend the ICE classes. They have so many choices, you're bound to find something that looks good. The classes are at all levels; they have classes for kids, couples, families; they have food-based walking tours of NY. The facilities are great, class size is limited to 16, and our instructor, Faith Drobin, was excellent. I know I'll be going back.

After class every day, I went back to my sister's apartment and played with my 3-year old niece Kate. We read a lot of Dr. Seuss, baked snickerdoodles, and did a lot of dancing (she's particularly fond of the songs Boom Boom Pow and anything by Pitbull). I even went to African, hip hop, and Belly Dancing classes - such a great week!

Baking snickerdoodles with Kate... Tsuki wanted a taste!

Day 1 focused on sweet tart dough (pate sucree). We made frangipane fruit tart, chocolate hazelnut tartelettes, coconut custard pie, banana walnut pie, lemon cheese tartelettes (similar to an Italian cheesecake), blueberry crumble pie, sour cherry crumble pie, and pecan pie. Well, my partner and I only made the first three, but the class together made all of the above. I've made a lot of pie before, but I can always use more practice in rolling out dough.

Chocolate Hazelnut Tartelettes

Day 2 was all about apples. We used the flaky pastry dough (pate brisee) for these.We made apple tarte tatin, apple pie, a pastry that was sort of a cross between an apple crostata and an apple dumpling, and individual fruit tarts with orange flavored pastry cream. I am a truly pathetic apple peeler. Although I only cut myself once, my partner Ana peeled the apples at least three times as fast as I did - maybe the knife skills class is in my future... Perhaps I should just go crazy and try peeling a few dozen apples all at once in an attempt to improve - like Julia Child did with her onions in the movie Julie and Julia (great movie by the way, even though I had to shield my eyes whenever there was any sort of lobster slaughter or duck de-boning episode...).

I prefer the taste of the regular apple pie to the tarte tatin, but the tarte tatin was so spectacular to behold - and it was fun to make: making the caramel, carefully placing the apples in the very very hot caramel, laying the crust over the apples, and baking it. I'd love to try a peach tarte tatin sometime, but a fresh peach tastes so perfect on its own, I can never bring myself to do anything else to it! I forgot my camera on apple day, so no pictures unfortunately...

Frangipane Fruit Tart

Day 3 was delicious: choux pastry. We made more pastry cream - praline and coffee this time. Either one would have made a fantastic "dessert" alone on a spoon. But we used the creams to fill eclairs and cream puffs. We also made a Paris-Brest (a bicycle tire-shaped pastry named for the cycling race from Paris to Brest). To make it, you trace a circle of any size on a sheet of parchment paper, then flip it over. Pipe one circle of pastry outside the circle, and another circle of pastry inside the circle. Finally pipe a third circle on top of and between the first two. Sprinkle sliced almonds on top and bake. When cool, you just slice the top third off the pastry, fill with whipped cream and strawberries, slice the top of the pastry into however many servings as desired, and place it on the whipped cream and berries. Finally top with powdered sugar.

This simple trick Chef Drobin taught us - cutting through the top layer of pastry before putting it on top of the whipped cream - was one of the most useful tips I learned last week. When serving, you only need to slide the knife through the previous cut and then cut through the bottom layer - easily done without smushing the pastry and cream together and destroying the look of the entire thing. I always find it extremely difficult to slice cakes and pies and tarts and even brownies without making an ugly mess, so I'll definitely remember this!

Somehow my pastries even made it home unwrecked that day, even after a half hour subway ride on a 90 degree day. When I was in Turin in July, I bought a lot of hazelnut praline, and I can't wait to use it in pastry cream form!

Praline Cream Puffs

Days 4 and 5 were devoted to puff pastry and strudel dough. Puff pastry was probably my favorite part of the class, and it's really the main reason I took the class. The strudel dough was also fantastic, so I think I'll leave those pictures and recipes for another day... here are some more pictures of what we made as well as a recipe or two.

Swan Cream Puff - made by Chef Faith Drobin

Recipe for Choux Pastry (from ICE)

3/4 cup water
6 tablespoons butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup flour
4 eggs (approximately)

Preheat oven to 425°F.

Combine water, butter, and salt in a medium saucepan over medium heat; bring to a boil, stirring constantly. When the mixture starts to boil, remove from heat and stir in flour.

Return to heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until the mixtures dries slightly and begins to leave the sides of the pan. Transfer to a bowl, and let stand for 5 minutes to cool; if using a stand mixer, beat for one minute to cool.

Beat in the eggs, one at a time; be sure to wait until each egg is fully incorporated before adding the next. You might not need the entire fourth egg; you might need another half egg. The dough should be stiff enough to pipe; if you swipe your finger through the dough, it should close up on itself.

Immediately pipe the dough into the desired shape (Paris Brest, cream puffs, profiteroles, or eclairs) and bake for about 10 minutes or until well-risen. Lower the oven temperature to 350°F and continue baking until completely dry. Chef Drobin told us that once the pastry looks done, it needs another 20 minutes or so in the oven - it should be completely firm when you take it out of the oven or it will collapse.

Recipe for Frangipane (from ICE)

4 ounces almond paste
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
4 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour

Combine the almond paste, sugar, egg, and yolk in the bowl of a stand mixer. Beat on medium speed with paddle attachment until smooth. Add the butter and beat until light. This will take a long time - go do other things. On low speed, beat until flour until just absorbed.

For Frangipane Fruit Tart:

Roll the dough (we used the sweeter dough, pate sucree) into a 14 inch disk, and line a 10 inch tart pan with it. Chill the dough for several hours or overnight. Spread the frangipane evenly on the bottom of the pastry shell. Top with fruit, pressing it in to the frangipane slightly. Don't cover the frangipane completely, leave plenty of space. Bake at 350°F for about 40 minutes, or until the filling is set.




Recipe for Chocolate Hazelnut Tartelettes (from ICE)

1 batch pate sucree
2 cups whole hazelnuts, toasted, skinned, and chopped
4 ounces semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
4 tablespoon butter
1 cup dark corn syrup
1/2 cup sugar
3 eggs
Pinch salt
2 tablespoons dark rum (I'd use Frangelico or Kahlua next time)


Preheat the oven to 350°F. Melt the chocolate with the butter in a small bowl.

Combine the corn syrup and sugar in a saucepan and stir well to mix. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove from heat and stir in chocolate mixture.

Whisk the eggs and salt with the rum. Beat in the chocolate mixture just until combined (this will keep the tart fudgier; it dries out if you beat too long). Stir in the chopped hazelnuts.

Roll out the dough and line a 10-inch tart pan or several smaller tartelette pans. Pour the filling into shell. Bake at 350°F until the filling is set and the crust is baked through, roughly 40 minutes for a large tart and 20-25 minutes for smaller tartelettes.

Finally a daring baker!

I'm finally a daring baker! For the past year or so, I've eagerly checked my regular blogs at the end of every month to see what the daring bakers were dishing up next. I can't say that I had the time or inspiration to be as creative with this one as, say, Helen of Tartelette or Aran of Canelle et Vanille, but it's a start. I hope to get to some of the previous daring baker challenges as well: streudel, eclairs, and tuiles, ...

This month's challenge was the bakewell tart. I thought these tarts were good, but I won't be rushing to make them again too soon (personally, I think Dorie Greenspan's sweet tart dough is better). I made 6 muffin-sized tarts and two brioche-mold-sized tarts. I had a lot of frangipane leftover. I think the main problem with the tarts was the filling: I did some with a milk chocolate ganache, some with raspberry jam, and some with a combination of the two. The jam got very jelly-like when cooked, so the texture was a little on the rubbery side. The chocolate was better, but I've definitely had more interesting chocolate tarts. Check out the rest of the daring bakers to see other interpretations of these tarts.





The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

Recipe:

For the Sweet Shortcrust Pastry Dough

Makes enough for one 9" tart or 8-9 smaller muffin-size tarts.

225g (8oz) all purpose flour
30g (1oz) sugar
½ tsp salt
1 stick (4oz) unsalted butter, cold (frozen is better)
2 egg yolks
½ tsp almond extract (I used vanilla)
1-2 Tbsp cold water

Sift together flour, sugar, and salt. Grate butter into the flour mixture, using the large hole-side of a box grater. Using your finger tips only, and working very quickly, rub the fat into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. Set aside. (I used the food processor)

Lightly beat the egg yolks with the extract, and quickly mix into the flour mixture. Keep mixing while dribbling in the water, only adding enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough.

Form the dough into a disc, wrap in cling and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

For the Frangipane

9 Tbsp (4.5oz) unsalted butter, softened
125g (4.5oz) powdered sugar
3 eggs
½ tsp almond extract (I used vanilla)
125g (4.5oz) ground almonds
30g (1oz) all purpose flour

Cream butter and sugar together for about a minute or until the mixture is primrose in color and very fluffy. Scrape down the side of the bowl and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. The batter may appear to curdle, but it’ll be fine. After all three are in, pour in the extract and mix for about another 30 seconds and scrape down the sides again. With the beaters on, spoon in the ground nuts and the flour. Mix well. The mixture will be soft, keep its slightly curdled look (mostly from the almonds) and retain its pallid yellow color.

Assembling the Tarts:

Place the chilled dough disc on a lightly floured surface. If it's overly cold, you will need to let it become acclimatised for about 15 minutes before you roll it out. Flour the rolling pin and roll the pastry to 5mm (1/4”) thickness, by rolling in one direction only (start from the center and roll away from you), and turning the disc a quarter turn after each roll. When the pastry is to the desired size and thickness, transfer it to the tart pan, press in, and trim the excess dough. Patch any holes, fissures or tears with trimmed bits. Chill in the freezer for 15 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400F.

Remove shell from freezer, spread as even a layer as you can of filling (I used raspberry jam on some, a chocolate ganache on some, and both the jam and ganache on others) onto the pastry base. Top with frangipane, spreading to cover the entire surface of the tart. Smooth the top and pop into the oven for 30 minutes (for the full-size tart, about 20 minutes for the smaller tarts). Five minutes before the tart is done, the top will be poofy and brownish. Remove from oven and strew flaked almonds on top and return to the heat for the last five minutes of baking. I had quite a bit of frangipane left over.

The finished tart will have a golden crust and the frangipane will be tanned, poofy, and a bit spongy-looking. Remove from the oven and cool on the counter. Serve warm, with crème fraîche, whipped cream, or custard sauce if you wish.

*Thank you Derrick for the photographs!