A lot of fuss - but maybe worth it

"as I'm a pastry cook at heart, I've been making all sorts of herb-laden tarts, including this lovely tomato one. It's very simple." Belinda Jeffery

This is a first recipe but a sort of cheat, in that it's not the next book on my shelf, but I just moved it into a section of my bookshelves that I have already covered, so I rescued it for its moment in the sun.

Well not quite, because when I bought it I did, of course, do a post on it which I called So very today. That was a more general overview however. Today I'm concentrating on this one recipe, which raises a few issues for me.

It's called Tomato, herb and goat's cheese tart in a no-roll cheese pastry and as you can see from the opening quote, which is from her introduction to the recipe, she considers it to be simple.

And to be fair it sort of is, but it takes a heck of a long time, because of some long waits - which I shall come to, and also it's not simple, in that you need to find some black garlic. Sometimes available in the supermarket, but not always - and costly to boot. Well the whole thing is a bit expensive if you buy proper goat's cheese, and the best tomatoes you can find. It's very middle-class I suppose. Not for the working poor. Nevertheless I think I'll have a go at it one day.

The book is arranged month by month through the year as it's based on her weekly online posts. So this is a January dish - summer, which means that I should probably wait a few more months before I give it a go. Turning to August I'm highlighting her Roasted lemon, garlic and chilli mushrooms just because it's from next Sunday's equivalent date, and so the nearest to today. If you like mushrooms give it a go. They'd probably make a good filling for a pie, or a topping for a tart as well. Or maybe add some meat and you've got dinner.

But back to the tart. Let me go through it bit by bit to show why I think it's all a bit of a faff.

First you make the pastry, which is pretty simple - basically just chuck it all in your mixer until it forms a dough. 'No roll pastry' is designed to make the process of lining your tart tin sound simpler than normal, but is it? Before you do anything with your ball of dough Belinda tells you to 'break off a 5 cent-size piece and pop it in the fridge, this can be used later to patch any cracks", which sounds a bit ominous doesn't it? But back to your ball of dough in your tart tin. What you have to do is press your ball of dough out until it evenly spreads over the base and the sides. Again a word of warning from Belinda - "Take your time to do this, so you get a nice, even coverage. If the sides are too thin, they may crumble as the pastry cooks." and then she suggests you "roll a tumbler over the base to help smooth out any bumps." All of which suggests that this is not going to be simple. Well I have done this before, and it actually isn't all that difficult, but to my mind it's simpler to roll it out. Maybe that's just me, and maybe it's a bit fragile as a pastry and might therefore be difficult to roll out and get into your tin without it tearing.

Now you have to put your tin on a baking sheet (why?) and 'pop' it in the fridge for 45 minutes. Or indeed overnight. So, good in that you can start this the day before you need to cook the tart, but bad in that you now have to wait.

Mind you as I read ahead I see that you could prepare your onion and garlic mixture whilst you are waiting, because not only do you have to do the usual peeling and slicing of the onions, and cook them, you also have to set them aside to cool down. So it would fit with the pastry chilling in the fridge. She doesn't suggest this however.

And you can also prepare your tomatoes, which have to be deseeded and drained, then sliced and drained again. And the eggs and cream mixture can be done whilst you are waiting for the pastry too. But none of this is suggested, other than to say these processes can be done in advance.

And actually your pastry takes much longer than its 45 minutes chilling time, because then you've got to do the blind baking - 25 minutes - which seems rather a long time to me. And here is where you might need that little ball of pastry you set aside, because she says "Don't worry if there are fine cracks in the pastry shell, just patch them with the reserved pastry." My immediate thought here was 'fine cracks' - which implies lots, and so will I have enough reserved pastry?

And we haven't finished with the pastry yet either, because now we brush it with egg yolk because -"this helps seal the pastry and stops the base becoming soggy once it's filled." and then you have to cook it for a further couple of minutes before more cooling down. Now I'm worrying about soggy pastry.

At last you get to fill the tart - onions first, then the tomatoes, and crumbled cheese on top. Put it on the oven rack and pour your egg and cream mixture on top of that. Bake for 40 minutes - that's a long time. Moreover she seems to suggest that it might take a little longer too. You have to test whether it's set by jiggling it a bit. When I cook a quiche it only takes about half an hour.

And then you leave it to settle in the tin for another 5 minutes.

So a lot of waiting, chilling, cooling and resting and a few hints of things going wrong. Which is all a bit daunting.

Now I know she is actually providing solutions for things that might, just might, go wrong, but it is a bit anxiety producing.

So is it worth it I wonder? After all, fundamentally this is a kind of quiche but with a different kind of pastry. Will it really take that long to cook? Maybe she is cooking it at a lower temperature than what I do. She says 200ºC for the blind baking and 180ºC for the final cooking, but I'm guessing that is not for a fan oven. And don't you hate it when recipes don't tell you whether the temperature is for a fan or a conventional oven? I have to say that's another thing I love about the Ottolenghi crew - they always tell you - and mostly it's fan.

I should try it some time to test it out, because it does look delicious and almost all of the recipes I have tried of hers have always been delicious. I'm nervous though.

YEARS GONE BY

August 21

2024 - Kohlrabi for Jenny - mostly from Ottolenghi

2023 - Nothing

2022 - Allsorts

2021 - Time for this and that

2020 - Missing

2019 - Nothing

2018 - Nothing

2017 - A sort of lucky dip - Stilton cheese

2016 - Blossom promises good things to come