Making a tart is one of the easiest recipes out there. And this one is just gorgeous. The tomato-zucchini goat cheese tart is simple yet rich in flavour and colour. There is pure harmony between roasted vegetables, creamy goat cheese and fresh herbs. Moreover, add some toasted nuts and you have a wonderful Sunday brunch or lunch idea.
A Tart is something that I like to make a lot. It is easy and you have millions of choices. I like it either sweet or savoury. However, I’m a much bigger fan of savoury tarts. If you are following me (Twitter, Instagram or Facebook) you probably have seen the colourful carrot tart, the rustic dry tomato tart, the famous Tarte Tatin, a perfect for Fall celery tart or the one with sweet potato crust. Yummy.
Like I mentioned earlier, the procedure to make a tart is very simple. For a start, you need a base, which is a lovely and buttery short-crust dough. It is simple and quick to prepare. A mixture of a few basic ingredients, where butter is the star, will smell amazing already before baking it. Delicious! I always say everything tastes better with butter and so does this tomato-zucchini goat cheese tart. Wink.
Add spices and herbs to the short-crust dough
Moreover, you can use different spices to add wonderful flavours to the dough. For instance, you can choose nutmeg, pepper, orange or lemon zest, rosemary or chili. Experiment with flavours and scents.
Additionally, the short-crust dough must rest for 20-30 minutes and the base must be baked before filling it with goodies. Here you have two options: first, bake it as I did. I just prickled the dough using a fork and baked it just like that. It came out perfectly fine (maybe slightly puffed, but not much).
Blind baking – yes or no?
Second, you can bake it blind. In other words, you are baking a tart without the filling. Therefore, you should put some weight on it when baking it. Usually, you cover it with parchment paper and on top, you add some dry peas or beans, in order to not let the dough puff up.
Furthermore, I shortly browned the zucchini in a pan, before placing them in the tart form. Consequently, they will have a lovely golden colour and they won’t need long to bake. More importantly, I didn’t use any additional batter beside tomatoes, zucchini and cheese. That means, there are no eggs, cream, sour cream, buttermilk or milk needed.
Ingredients for a tomato-zucchini goat cheese tart (20 cm Ø):
- 125 g flour
- 1 egg
- 90 g butter (cold, cubed) plus some for greasing the form
- 3 Tbsp cold water
- 1 Tbsp olive oil
- salt, pepper
- 1 tsp nutmeg
- 1-2 zucchini (sliced)
- 2 tomatoes (sliced)
- 180-200 g goat cheese (look for the soft cheese)
- 25 g pine nuts
- basil
- 3 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 2 tsp honey
Begin with making the short-crust dough. In a bowl, mix flour, a pinch of salt, black pepper, cold butter, an egg, olive oil, nutmeg and cold water. You can mix it either with a hand mixer (using the dough hooks) or with your hands.
Chill the dough, heat the oven, cut the veggies
Once the crumbles start to form, quickly, while kneading it, form a ball, wrap it in a cling foil and put in the fridge for 20-30 minutes to rest. At the same time, preheat the oven to 200º C.
In the meantime, grease the tart form with some butter or olive oil. I like to use butter. It gives so much more flavour. Doesn’t it? Moving on, wash the zucchini and tomatoes. Cut them into slices. Something between 0,5 and 1 cm will be just fine. In a larger non-sticking pan, heat some olive oil and when it gets hot, add the zucchini, until golden-brown. Then, place on a plate and put aside.
When the 20 minutes are over, take the dough out of the fridge, dust the working surface with some flour and roll the dough out. I like the crust to be not too thin, but also not too thick. Try to roll it out until it is 3-5 mm thin.
Now, lay the dough over the tart form and gently push it into the form. Make sure you press it against the side of the form as well. In the end, using a sharp knife, cut off the extra dough hanging over the form (I used it for two small tartelettes. But you can wrap it back in the cling foil, place in the fridge and use it the next day). Don’t forget to prickle the dough all over the bottom of the form. Put to bake for 15 minutes (here you can decide on blind baking or not).
Make a lovely pattern
While the base for tomato-zucchini goat cheese tart is baking, cut the cheese into slices (try to make them as thick as the veggies). Once the short-crust base is ready (it should have a thin dry layer), remove it from the oven and start placing the zucchini, tomato and cheese slices into the form.
In order to get a lovely pattern, try to alternate them (tomato, zucchini cheese, tomato, zucchini, cheese and so on). I started on the outside and moving slowly towards the middle. Season well and put to bake for another 15-20 minutes or until the tart turns golden-brown.
At this point, toast the pine nuts a little bit. They are a lovely crunchy yet soft addition. In a small bowl mix the balsamic vinegar and honey. Yummy. This adds some sweetness and sourness at the same time.
When the tart is ready and the cheese is melted, remove it from the oven and let it cool down for 10 minutes. This will allow the tart to set. Consequently, it will be easier to cut, without crumbling and falling to pieces.
Finally, add the toasted pine nuts on the top of the tomato-zucchini goat cheese tart and sprinkle with some more black pepper. For the fresh touch add some fresh basil leaves and drizzle with the balsamic-honey mixture. Cut it into quarters and serve next to a salad, fish or some meat. You can also just eat it like it is. It’s a perfect brunch, lunch or supper idea.
Enjoy!
PS
If you like the recipe, if you make the recipe or if you have any new ideas how to improve or change it, let me know in the comments section below or alternatively share your photos and reactions with me on Instagram (@Passionspoon), Facebook or Twitter (@PassionSpoon1). Simply use the hashtag #passionspoonrecipes in your posts. I would love to see them! (wink)
