Summer fruits are here and I love it! At the farmers market the other day I saw two things I can't find too often around here: Saskatoon berries and sour cherries.
Saskatoon berries look a lot like blueberries, but they taste completely different. When they're raw they are a little bitter, but baked in this tart they taste nutty and delicious, and go great with the sour cherries. They also keep their shape really well when cooked.
Sour cherries are amazing. I love sweet cherries but I've never used sour cherries before. They are bright red on the outside but their juice is clear, not dark like sweet cherries. They need to be sweetened but they have such a great cherry flavour. I can't wait to bake more with them!
This is a super easy puff-pastry galette, but you can use the filling for a regular pie if you prefer. I have a cherry pitter to pit the cherries, but you can use a knife if you don't have a pitter, and it's a lot less messy with sour cherries than sweet.
Ingredients: 1.5 cups Saskatoon berries 1.5 cups sour cherries, pitted 1/2 cup granulated sugar 1/4 cup brown sugar 1 tablespoon lemon juice 2 tablespoons cornstarch 1 sheet frozen all-butter puff pastry, thawed 1 egg, beaten 1 tablespoon turbinado sugar (raw sugar) or granulated sugar Directions: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Mix the berries, cherries, sugars, lemon juice and corn starch in a large bowl until well combined. Roll out the puff pastry on a sheet of parchment on a baking tray and poke it with a fork all over. Mound the berry mixture in the middle of the pastry and fold the edges roughly up over the filling. Brush the outside of the pastry with the beaten egg and sprinkle with raw sugar. Bake for 25 minutes until golden brown and crisp. If juices leak from the tart, that's ok! Serve warm or at room temperature with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.
Here's another Tart of the Month! I've been slacking on my tart prep in 2016. Things have been hectic and I've had very little time for baking, but this tart is so quick and easy, it barely counts as baking at all!
I had leftover cheese and fruit from a dinner party we had, so I decided to put it all together in some puff pastry for a tasty snack. You can use virtually any combination of cheese and fruit - blueberries and cream cheese, peaches and goat's cheese, apples and cheddar, pears and blue cheese... the possibilities are endless.
Simply slice up the fruit and place it on a sheet of thawed puff pastry.
Then top with the cheese of your choice either sliced, spread, or crumbled over the fruit
I attempted to get fancy and create a braid pattern by slicing the puff pastry in diagonal strips on either side of the filling. I should have started braiding at the bottom though.
My braid pattern didn't turn out as nicely as I'd hoped, but it's still kind of neat!
Mix an egg with a little water and brush over the pastry and sprinkle with raw sugar.
Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes until browned and crisp. The cheese will melt out the sides a bit but that's ok!
Slice and serve warm or at room temperature. This makes a great snack or appetizer for a party. Or even a not-too-sweet dessert, perhaps with a little whipped cream or ice cream. Enjoy this easy tart with all the fruits coming into season soon!
If I've learned one thing from my Tart of the Month series, it's this: Keep frozen puff pastry on hand and you can whip up a tart for dinner, breakfast or appetizers any time.
We are moving to a new house at the end of the month so we have been very busy for a while now. So this tart is extremely easy and uses ingredients we always have on hand. It's just apples, onions, sour cream and puff pastry. Here's what you need for these easy, tasty tarts:
It's been a very busy month around here, so I didn't have time to make a new tart in September. Instead, I thought I'd browse the archives for seasonal Autumn tarts I've made in the past. There are some real winners here!
Tarte flambée, or Flammekueche is similar to pizza and makes a wonderful dinner when nights get cooler.
Carrots are in season and I love the way this Carrot and Herb Tart uses a variety of coloured carrots with the green of fresh herbs.
And, finally, it isn't really fall without some pumpkin spice. These Pumpkin Spice Tarts have a gingersnap crust I love. Get outside and enjoy the season!
I think I finally discovered the key to loving rhubarb. It seems so obvious, but mixing it with strawberries makes all the difference! Strawberry and rhubarb go so wonderfully together. The tartness of the rhubarb is a great compliment to the sweet berries.
These galettes are very easy. A galette is a free-form tart, and making these with frozen puff pastry mean you can whip them up in minutes. Here's what you need for these yummy spring treats:
I was away this weekend four our third annual cousins retreat where my sister-in-law and three lady cousins and I enjoy a weekend in Blue Mountain, Ontario.
April's tart of the month is not exactly seasonal. Carrots are available year round but at their peak in late summer and fall. But the fresh herbs and ricotta make this tart light and spring-like, and the beautiful, multi-coloured carrots are striking.
This is one of those incredibly easy puff pastry tarts that can be whipped up in 30 minutes or so. This beautiful tart comes from Bon Appetit magazine. Here's what you need:
I'm getting addicted to these easy puffpastry tarts. Most of the time you just top the puff pastry with a few ingredients, bake 20 minutes and you're done. This recipe from Martha Stewart uses thin slices of raw beet. It seems like an odd combination with cheddar and apples but the taste and texture is great! Here's what you need:
I have plenty more to tell about our road trip to Nashville, but let's take a break from travel for our tart of the month! This month we're doing asparagus again. We have a small asparagus patch in our garden and due to the cold winter and late spring, it is just starting to produce asparagus now in mid May. Asparagus is one of my favourite vegetables so it gets two months of tarts before spring turns to summer and I suspect the tart of the month will turn from savoury to sweet for a while.
This tart is so easy. Once again, no pastry skills needed, just frozen puff pastry. Here's what you need for this simple spring tart from Martha Stewart:
The other day I mentioned I've never made a pie crust. Even thought we were blessed with some amazing wild blueberries, I've still managed to avoid it. I plan to make one someday, but until then, this super-simple galette will do for sure.
A galette is essentially a free-form pie or tart. The pastry is folded over the filling in a casual way, not crimped and fancy like a regular pie crust. Perfect for my lazy dessert stylings.
We happened to be in Muskoka recently and saw some wild blueberries available at the roadside. They came from Sudbury and were not cheap, but they were very tasty!
Sometimes leftovers can be transcendent. Even better than the original meal! These chicken turnovers or hand pies fall into that category. The recipe comes from Martha Stewart, slightly adapted. She calls them hand pies, a term that makes me giggle. But whatever you call them, it is an amazing use for leftover chicken. You've gotta try these. I was looking for a use for the leftovers from all the roasted chicken I made. I was thinking of making a pot pie but I don't really have suitable-sized ramekins for individual pot pies. Last time they were way too big. So I was toying with the idea of making a pot pie filling but using puff pastry to make a turnover, and that's when I stumbled upon Martha's recipe with a totally different flavour profile than pot pie and even more delicious. Here's what you need:
leftover cooked chicken
leftover gravy (optional but highly recommended)
sweet potatoes (ideally leftover, cooked, cold but you can cook them for the recipe)
1 sheet puff pastry, thawed
1/2 cup cream or milk
1 egg
1/2 tsp each cumin andground coriander, divided
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (optional, not pictured, divided)
First, I'll fill you in on my error. I didn't have leftover cooked sweet potatoes the recipe calls for, so I figured I could cook some quickly in the microwave and mash them. It's totally ok to do this, but you need lots of time for the sweet potatoes to cool. It didn't occur to me until I was putting hot sweet potatoes onto cold puff pastry that I'd made an error. The puff pastry thrives on being kept cold until it goes into the oven, so putting the hot potatoes on it melted the butter and made it less flaky that it would normally be. It still turned out delicious, but next time I'd make sure all my ingredients are cold before starting.
So anyway, if you don't have leftovers, peel your sweet potatoes (about a pound) and add them with a little water to a microwave-safe bowl. Cover with a lid or plastic wrap and microwave on high for about 6 minutes. Toss them around and microwave for 6 minutes more until tender.
To 1/2 cup cream or milk, add 1/4 tsp cayenne, coriander and cumin.
Add the cream mixture to the sweet potatoes and sprinkle with salt.
Mash the sweet potatoes. They don't have to be too fine, just mixed together. Then LET THEM COOL!
Meanwhile, dice 2 cups cooked leftover chicken.
Add in about 1/2 a cup of leftover gravy. This is optional but I found it gave the pies an amazing flavour.
Season with another 1/4 teaspoon each of cumin and coriander and a little more cayenne if you like it spicy.
Mix the gravy in with the chicken. It doesn't look tasty but it will be, believe me!
Now it's time to roll out your puff pastry. Sprinkle a little flour on your work surface.
Martha asks you to roll it out to a 12-inch square. I am terrible at guesstimating lengths so I used a measuring tape. It started out at 10-inches square.
I got it a little too thin but if you can get it to 12-inches square, that's the perfect thickness.
Then use a sharp knife (or pizza cutter) to cut it into quarters.
Crack your egg into a small bowl and beat lightly. This will seal the edges and create a golden crust.
Now, spread your cooled sweet potatoes over half of the puff pastry square.
Repeat for all four squares. You'll want to spread it out over the whole half, unlike what I show here. That way you'll have filling in the corners too.
Then top each with 1/4 of the chicken gravy mixture.
Brush a little egg wash around the edges of the pastry.
Now fold the puff pastry into a triangle. I found it easiest to flip the filled side over onto the unfilled side.
Then use a fork to crimp the edge of the pastry so the filling stays inside. Don't worry about little tears. The puff pastry is pretty forgiving. Mine tore mostly because I used a warm filling.
Repeat with all four and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
With a sharp knife, cut slits in the pastry to let steam escape.
Then brush with the egg.
Bake in a 400 degree oven for about 30 minutes, rotating the pan half way through, until puffed and golden.
I served these with steamed broccoli.
These were incredibly delicious and a completely different taste than normal leftover chicken. I highly recommend trying this!
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.JPG "carrots, herbs, ricotta, red onion")
