Weekend Cooking: Tarte Tatin à la Tomate

I haven’t done a weekend cooking post in ages, but I was inspired after making a really good recipe this past week. It’s from a cookbook that I was given last Christmas but had never actually used, and it’s definitely made me want to use it more because the recipe turned out beautifully. This is a good one to try if you are lucky enough to still have some summer tomatoes hanging around.

Note: The photo on the left is not my tart. Mine was much more rustic looking than that, and it was so good that we ate it all before I thought to take a picture. But it gives you an idea of the finished result.

Tarte Tatin à la Tomate
(adapted from Chocolate & Zucchini by Clotilde Dusoulier)
Serves 8 as a starter, 4 as a main course

Ingredients:

• Frozen pie crust (the recipe actually has you make your own, but I don’t have that much energy)
• Extra virgin olive oil
• 1 kg Roma or plum tomatoes
• Salt and pepper
• Herbes de provence (or a good mix of dried rosemary, basil, oregano and thyme)
• Olive tapenade
• Fresh mozzarella
• A handful of fresh basil leaves (I omitted this, as I didn’t have any)

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C/350 degrees F. Grease a quiche pan with 1 teaspoon olive oil.
2. Have the tomatoes lengthwise and core them. Run your thumb in the hollows of the tomatoes to remove the juice and seeds. Arrange in the pan, skin side down, in a circular pattern. They can overlap a bit, as they will shrink as they bake. Season with salt, pepper, herbs, and a good drizzle of olive oil. Bake for 30 minutes, until soft.
3. Remove the dough from the fridge about 10 minutes before the end of the tomatoes’ cooking time, so that it has time to loosen up. Roll out the dough and prick all over with a fork. Spread with the tapenade, leaving a 3 cm margin all around.
4. Cut the cheese in thin slices and arrange over the tomatoes in the pan. Lay the dough, tapenade side down, on the cheese and tuck in the overhanging flaps of dough. Bake for 30-40 minutes, until the crust is golden.
5. Let cool for a few minutes, then run a knife around the crust to loosen. Cover the pan with an overturned serving plate and flip the whole thing carefully. If some of the tomatoes stick to the bottom of the pan, just put them back in the tart where they belong. Serve warm or at room temperature. Just before serving, snip or tear the basil leaves and sprinkle over the tart.

VARIATIONS

One of the nice things about this recipe is that you can vary it to suit your tastes. For example, instead of spreading the dough with tapenade, you could use pesto, a sun-dried tomato spread, or spicy mustard (I have a friend who swears by this combo). If you prefer, you can use goat cheese instead of mozzarella.

Enjoy!

Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads and is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs…