Tomato Tart with Puff Pastry

 

This tart is a great way to use some of the beautiful and colourful heirloom tomatoes that you grow in your garden. And it uses store-bought puff pastry because it’s just so easy. 

** Making this doesn’t take a lot of time but you do have to do a couple of steps in advance to make sure your tart pastry isn’t soggy, so please read the instructions through in advance. **

Yield: Lunch for 4, appetizer for more

Ingredients:

4-5 medium tomatoes, thinly sliced

7-10 cherry tomatoes, sliced

1-2 tbsp chopped fresh herbs (any combo: thyme, basil, tarragon, parsley, oregano etc but must be fresh)

2 tbsp Dijon mustard

1 tsp butter

3 tsp milk

1 sheet frozen puff pastry (defrosted overnight in fridge)

1 ½ cups grated sharp cheese (gruyere is best)

Salt & pepper

Olive oil

Method: 

Defrost pastry overnight in the fridge. **

Thinly slice tomatoes and spread out in a single layer on a cutting board or two. Cover with paper towel to absorb the liquid. You will probably have to do this twice at least so give it a couple of hours. Having dry-ish tomatoes means your tart pastry won’t be soggy. **

Preheat oven to 400 F

Cover a large baking sheet with parchment paper.

Unroll the defrosted pastry on to the parchment and stretch it out a little bit.  With a sharp knife, score the pastry ½” or 1.5 cm inside the edge all the way around, making sure you don’t cut through the pastry.

Inside the score line, poke the pastry all over with a fork. Cover the inside area with a thin layer of Dijon mustard.

Melt the butter in a small bowl and add the milk. Brush the mixture over the scored edge of the pastry. This will help it to brown up a bit. Put the prepared pastry into the over to brown for about 15 minutes.

Remove pastry from the oven and press down with a fork any of the inside area that is puffy.

Spread cheese in thin layer across the bottom of the pastry. Then lay the tomatoes in a single layer (make it pretty!) from edge to edge on the inside section of the pastry.

Sprinkle with a bit of salt and the chopped herbs. Drizzle with a little bit of olive oil and fresh ground pepper if you like.

Put that gorgeous baby in to the oven for about 25 minutes (don’t let the crust get too brown on the edges) et voila!

Remove from the over and let cool. This tart is delicious both warm and at room temperature so it can be made a few hours ahead.

 

 

  

 ©️ Gail J. Cohen 2021

 

Blow your socks off 7-pot chocolate chile and honey BBQ sauce

What's the point of growing chiles in your garden if you aren't going to experiment with crazy sauces? This one uses 7-pot chocolate chiles (aka: 7 Pot Douglah), which is one of the hottest peppers in the world coming in at about 2 million on the Scoville scale. It's got a fruity nutty flavour but mostly these chiles are just fiery - as is this bbq sauce.

If you like hot chicken wings, this is the sauce for you!

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Yield: About 500 ml or 2 cups.

Ingredients:

2 finely chopped 7-pot chocolate chiles/habaneros/carolina reapers etc
(use 1 if you are not in the mood to remove layers from inside your mouth and throat 😊)
2 cups ketchup
½ cup cider vinegar
¼ cup packed brown sugar
2 tbsp honey (raw is best)
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp lime juice
3-4 drops liquid smoke
½ tsp black pepper
½ tsp garlic powder
½ tsp onion powder
1 tsp kosher salt
¼ cup of water

Method:

Mix the black pepper, garlic and onion powders and the kosher salt in the ¼ cup of water and stir it up making sure there’s no clumps.

Stir chopped chiles, ketchup, honey, vinegar and brown sugar together in a pot over medium heat until it’s smooth.

Add the Worcestershire sauce, liquid smoke, lime juice and water with the seasoning to the chile and ketchup mixture in the pot and stir thoroughly. Bring to the boil and then reduce heat to low. Simmer for about 20 minutes. If it’s too thick for your liking, add a bit more water.

Remove from heat and let cool. It will keep in the fridge for a few weeks if put into sterilized glass containers. Also freezes well.

© 2020 Gail J Cohen

 

Caramelized Onion & Tomato Pie

This is a great summer brunch dish and also an excellent way to use some of the beautiful tomatoes that you’ve grown in your garden or got at the local market. Serve with a fresh salad.

Makes 4 servings

Ingredients

2-3 medium tomatoes, thinly sliced

6 cherry tomatoes, cut into quarters

1 medium onion thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic finely sliced

1 sheet frozen puff pastry (defrosted)

1.5 cups grated gouda

1 egg, beaten

A few sprigs of fresh thyme or ½ tsp dried thyme

1 tsp balsamic vinegar (the more aged/thick the better)

1 tbsp of butter

Flour for dusting

Method:

Put the sliced and cut tomatoes onto a few sheets of paper towel and sprinkle lightly with salt. This will help to draw the liquid out and make your pie more crispy.

Heat the butter in a medium sized frying pan and saute the onions for about 15 minutes on medium. Sprinkle a bit of salt while they’re cooking and stir frequently. They should get all dark and soft and caramelized. Once they are just about ready, toss in the garlic and saute for a minute or so. You don’t want the garlic to burn as it’ll get very bitter. Take off the heat and set aside.

Preheat your oven to 425F and line a baking pan or pizza pan with parchment paper.

Dust your counter or board in preparation for the pastry. Take your now-defrosted puff pastry (or make it if you have nothing but time on your hands!) and roll it out a few times just to make it a bit thinner than it is out of the package.

A whole piece of puff pastry is probably too big so maybe cut a quarter off the end and use that to make a few either sweet or savoury turnover. (I made swiss chard and goat cheese ones).

Roll the pastry onto your roller and then unroll it nicely onto the parchment paper covered pan. Prick the pastry a bit with a fork.

Take your now cool onions and spread them on the pastry. Leave a bit of an edge because you’re going to fold the edge over for max prettiness.

Cover the onions with a layer of cheese. Then artfully place the sliced tomatoes on top of the cheese. Make a frame around the edge of the onion/cheese/tomatoes with the little wedges of cherry tomato. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and thyme. Drizzle the balsamic vinegar over the top of it all.

Now gently fold the extra pastry over the top. It will form a frame around the edge (whether you do it as a rectangle or a circle). Lastly, give a generous egg wash all around the pastry on the top.

Bake for about 20-25 minutes until the pastry is a nice darkish brown. If there’s a little too much liquid still in your tomatoes once the pastry is done, you can just daub it with a bit of paper towel once you take it out the oven.

Let it cool for a few minutes, top with some fresh basil, then serve and enjoy.

© 2020 Gail J Cohen

Garden fresh gazpacho

This year I planted green pepper basil in my garden. It is exactly as you can imagine - green leafy plant that tastes like a mix of basil and green peppers. I had never seen it before and didn't really know what to do with it but wanted to use it...so the combination of many ripe tomatoes and this new fangled green pepper basil led to the following gazpacho recipe.

I also didn't feel like cooking. This whole operation took about 10 minutes including picking things in the garden.

Green pepper basil

Yield: 2 large servings

Ingredients

1 beefsteak tomato
1/4 white onion
1/3 English cucumber
1/3 red pepper
2 green basil leaves
1/2 garlic clove
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tbsp olive oil
Pinch of salt

Basically cut all the vegetables up a bit then put it all into a blender with the vinegar, oil, and salt. Waz it up for about 30 seconds - you still want a bit of chunkiness in your soup. Check the seasoning and add salt or more vinegar to suit your taste.

Serve and enjoy.

© 2018 Gail J Cohen

Vegan basil hemp pesto

I've been cooking but not writing about it much lately. Trying to get back on track. The fall harvest is a great time to do it! Here's one for the gardeners (and the vegans).

If you're like me, you tend to grow basil in your garden in the summer and there's only so much of it you can use before the frost get it. Pesto is one of the greatest ways to use up large amounts of the fresh stuff. And making it takes hardly any time at all.

And this recipe mixes it with one of my favourite (and local!) seeds: hemp, which have an extraordinary nutty flavour that is enhanced by toasting the seeds before making the mixture. Add a little hemp oil to ratchet up that nuttiness. The fresh parsley, which is likely also in your garden, adds a bit of herby lightness.

Yield:  1.5 cups

Ingredients

1/2 cup hemp seeds

3 loosely packed cups of fresh basil leaves

1 sprig fresh Italian parsley

2 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

3 tbsp cold pressed hemp oil

2 tbsp nutritional yeast

1/2 tsp salt

fresh ground pepper

Toast the hemp seeds in a non-stick pan on medium heat. It will seem like it takes a while but keep your eyes on it at all times because the seeds will go from not toasted to burnt in about 30 seconds. The toasting shouldn't take more than about 5-6 minutes depending on the pan you're using. Cool before making the pesto.

Clean the basil and parsley, making sure it's mostly dry before continuing on.

Add all the ingredients into a food processor. Blend for about a minute making sure the garlic is all chopped and it is quite smooth and creamy. Check the seasonings and voila. 

Use it on pasta, add cream/cream substitute if you want to make a creamy sauce, use it dressing for salads, etc.  It'll keep in the fridge for about a week but you can also freeze it in ice cube trays and save it for later when you're yearning for some garden freshness in the middle of winter.

© Gail J. Cohen 2017

I'm smokin' hot (sauce)

Every year I plant hot peppers in my lovely little garden. I tend to have a bit of a variety but every year I put in cayenne peppers because they never disappoint. This year I only had one plant but supplemented it with some serranos and jalapenos, so had a good variety of hot peppers. And at the end of the season, there are always lots left over. So what to do with lots of fiery little chiles?  Well make them into hot sauce, of course! 

Here's my quite simple hot sauce recipe from the archives:

Yield: about 100 ml

Ingredients:

1 dozen cayenne peppers
2 heads of garlic
3/4 cup of vinegar
salt
pinch of sugar

I had a lot of cayenne peppers and the others that I also grew, so threw a few of those in the mix, and made 4x the recipe.

.

First cut off the stem, slit, and remove the seeds of each pepper. Please do this with gloves. And don't touch your eyes, nose, or mouth while you're doing the deed. The burn is fierce.

The traditional Tobasco Sauce has "aged" peppers but in the age of instant gratification, I deepened the flavour by roasting the peppers a bit. I used my favourite Mexican style of dry roasting on the comal, but you can do it in a large non-stick frying pan or by broiling them in the oven until the skin turns a bit black. Some people suggest taking the skins off after the roasting but seriously, that's a bunch of fiddling around that takes up time I'll never get back. So I just tossed them, the garlic (which I also roasted but there's no need to), and the vinegar into the blender and wazzed it all up.

Once it's all lovely and liquidized, simmer the mix on the stove for about 20 minutes. At this point, the whole kitchen, if not house, will start smelling like hot sauce. There may be some burning eyes. It's all for a good cause.

Once the simmering of the flavours is done, run the whole thing through a sieve to clear out the pulp, seeds, and skin.

This, I would say is the time to add the salt, if you're not too busy forgetting to do it like I did, and sugar.

You need to prepare some jars to put this lovely concotion in. I didn't have any traditional style bottles so I used small jam jars (125 ml each). They need to be washed out with boiling water and new lids prepared in boiling water. Once that's all ready, pour the sauce in, seal and you're ready to go with some smokin' hot sauce!

Salata de berenjena (Eggplant salad)

Salata de berenjena is one of those dishes my family has been eating ever since I was a little kid and was definitely not something I enjoyed back then. But as a ‘grown up’ I love it. Simple, fresh ingredients that with a little TLC yield a spectacularly tasty appetizer or side dish.

This salad is also a great way to use up the less-than-perfect tomatoes from the garden at the end of the season.

It’s not a traditional salad but more along the lines of a ratatouille as almost everything is cooked. The salata is not something I make very often because it’s quite time consuming ̶ and really my parents have always made fabulous versions of it, so why mess with someone else’s success? Below is my dad’s version of this traditional Sephardi Jewish vegetable salad.

Leave yourself a bit of time – maybe 1.5 hours – to prepare it as there’s lots of slicing and frying. It’s also best made a day ahead but at the least in the morning if you’re going to have it for dinner. The vegetables need to marinate to realize their full deliciousness.

Yield: 10 servings

Ingredients

1 large eggplant, peeled and sliced
3 green or red peppers
3 tomatoes, thickly sliced
3 small potatoes, sliced
2 tbsp chopped parsley
oil for frying

Dressing:

1/3 cup white vinegar
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp salt

The slices of eggplant should be about 1 cm thick.  Salt and place in a colander to drain for 30 minutes.

While the eggplant is doing its thing, put your oven on broil with the rack near (but not right at) the top. Cut the peppers in half, remove the seeds, and place skin up on a foil-covered baking tray in the oven for 15 minutes. Bake until they are tender and their skin is charred and blistered. Remove from the oven and let cool, then peel and slice.

Start frying your potatoes in a large, non-stick frying pan. Don’t be shy with the oil but you are not deep frying them either. Continue to add frying oil as you need it along the way. Cook the potato disks to a lovely golden brown and drain on some absorbent paper when they’re ready.

Those who know more than I do suggest dipping the eggplant in a bit of milk before frying it so it absorbs less oil. I do it but can’t actually attest to whether it makes a difference. Either way, fry the slices of eggplant until they’ve got a little bit of black on each side (key says my dad) and then drain on some paper.

Gently fry the tomatoes. You want them a bit soft but if you fry them too long they’ll just turn into mush, so don’t overdo it.

Once everything is fried and cooled, layer the potato, eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes in a glass or ceramic dish. Sprinkle the parsley generously on the top. Mix the dressing and pour over the vegetables.

Let it cool completely before covering with cling wrap. If you are leaving it overnight, you can put it in the fridge but be sure to take it out a couple of hours before serving because it should be at room temperature for maximum flavour. Just before serving toss the salad gently to get all the flavours mixed up but without making the vegetables into pulp.

© 2016 Gail J. Cohen

You can't beet this curry

I used to live right in downtown Toronto and just down the street in Cabbagetown was an unassuming Sri Lankan restaurant in a somewhat ramshackle old house. I can’t remember how I first ended up eating at Rashnaa there but I do remember that it was a taste revelation for me and I have probably eaten there more than anywhere else in the city. Most of the time I would order the mutton kottu roti, which is a spicy, meaty, plate of wonderousness. When something is that good, why stray, but at some point I started ordering a side of one of their vegetable curries. Now they have a lot of the standard ones but they also have a few special ones that they don’t make every day, so it’s a bit of a lottery if they’re going to have them on the day you decide to eat there.

My three favourites are beet, spinach, and okra. None of which are easy to replicate. I have scoured the internet for recipes for all of them and tried a few but not had the best luck. This is the closest I’ve come to Rashnaa’s beet curry and is adapted from a recipe at My New Roots. Joy factor also ratched up as the beets came out of my own garden.

One of the things that I really like is the flavour of curry leaves, which are an aromatic leaf from a citrusy tree and are completely unrelated to curry powder. They are incredibly fragrant, and not at all spicy, giving off a nutty scent when cooked. They apparently also have tremendous health benefits. You can buy curry leaves fresh and dried in most Indian and even some regular grocery stores.

Yield: 3-4 servings

Ingredients

2 – 3 medium-sized beets
1 tbsp coconut oil
1 tsp black mustard seeds
1 tsp ground coriander
20 dried or 15 fresh curry leaves
2 green chiles, finely chopped
1 stick cinnamon
1 large onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tsp. salt, plus more for finishing
1 cup full-fat coconut milk
juice of 1 lime
1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Peel beets and cut them into matchsticks. You might want to wear gloves for this to avoid getting bright pink hands.

In a medium-sized pot over medium-high heat, melt coconut oil. Add the mustard seeds, stirring constantly until they start to pop. Quickly add the coriander, curry leaves, chiles, and cinnamon, stir well, and fry for a minute.

Add the onion and saute until they are translucent, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and saute for another minute.

Add beets, salt, and coconut milk, bring to a simmer, reduce heat low and cover. Simmer gently so the coconut milk doesn’t split, for about 20 minutes until the beets are fork tender.

Once the beets are done, turn off the heat and stir in the lime juice. Check your salt levels and then gently fold in the cilantro.

Serve hot with rice and any other vegetable curries you might like.

The beautiful beet curry along with a chicken in onion gravy, smoked eggplant and herbs, and a mushroom curry.

What to cook with your tomato harvest 1: Shakshuka

Shakshuka, the traditional Israeli breakfast dish, is an easy and fantastic way to use the glut of tomatoes that home gardeners get in late August and early September. When I was a kid my father occasionally made (or more likely asked my mother to make) heuvos con tomate, a traditional sephardi Jewish dish. It was always very special because it was a very unusual treat. This shakshuka recipe is pretty much the same thing and probably why I like it so much. And as a bonus, it is pretty low calorie and low fat!

At this time of year, I’m eating at least one tomato meal a day. Yesterday was a three-tomato-meal day. I choose to plant heirloom tomatoes in my garden, so generally I do not cook with them but when you’re bringing in armfuls of the beauties each day, you have to do something with them.

For the most part, the tomatoes I have also vary in colour from yellow, to orange, to green, purple, and red so the sauces made with them don’t tend to be the traditional deep red you expect but more often a lighter orange. Don’t be fooled by the colour, the taste is pure essence of tomato! So use whatever tomatoes you have around but freshly picked ones will definitely give you the best flavour.

Yield: 2 generous servings

Ingredients:

2 large or 4 medium tomatoes of any type
1 small onion, diced
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 roasted red pepper, sliced
2 tbsp olive oil
1 fresh chile (serano, thai, jalapeno, or cayenne), seeded and chopped (optional)
2 tbsp chopped fresh herbs: oregano, parsley, thyme, and/or basil
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp kosher salt
pinch of sugar (optional)
Pepper to taste
4 eggs

Boil some water and blanche the tomatoes so you can easily remove the skins. Once you remove the skin, dice the tomatoes. You can remove the seeds if you want, but that is not time in my life that I like to spend, so mine has seeds!

Chop the onion, garlic, and chile pepper. Heat the oil over med-high heat in a medium-sized frying pan (I prefer cast iron for this dish). Saute the onions for 5 minutes or so until they start turning golden brown. Add the garlic and saute for another minute.

Add the tomatoes, roasted red pepper, herbs, cumin, paprika, salt, and pepper to the pan. The chile is optional but the heat adds a nice dimension to the dish. This amount won’t make it too spicy but if you’re not too keen on the heat, you can use half a chile instead. Check the flavour and if it’s very tangy, you can add the pinch of sugar.

Simmer over med-low heat for at least 10 minutes, you don’t want the sauce to be too watery. Often with garden tomatoes there is quite a bit more liquid than store bought so you should simmer until most of the liquid is evaporated, up to 18 minutes or so. Check your seasoning and add more salt and pepper if you need it.

Once the sauce is a good consistency, gently crack the eggs over the sauce and delicately place them in the pan. Cover and steam until the eggs are done to your liking. I prefer runny yolks, which usually takes about 5-6 minutes. If you prefer the white and/or yolk harder, just cook for a couple more minutes.

To serve: using a large serving spoon, gently take one spoonful of egg and the shakshuka at a time and spoon into a flat, wide bowl. Sprinkle with the chopped fresh parsley and serve piping hot with some crispy toast on the side.

© Gail J Cohen 2016

Potato salad with creamy roasted poblano dressing

Harvest time is prime time. Even from my small urban garden, the ripening of the vines of tomatoes, peppers, and other vegetables and herbs is cause for much annual excitement and creativity.

Every year, I plant a selection of heirloom tomatoes – thanks to the seeding efforts of others much more skilled at this than I – as well as a few other things I want to try out. Space and direct sun are pretty scarce around my house so the vegetable garden is set right up on the sidewalk, where, I’m happy to report, neighbours and others are kind enough not to pilfer my produce!

The last few years, my little plot has included poblano peppers, those shiny, dark green Mexican pods that deliver what I consider one of the greatest flavours on earth: slightly smoky, fresh, a bit of heat, and a great colour!

In this recipe, all the herbs, poblanos, and the knob onion come from right outside my front door. That’s 100-foot eating if you’re counting! The salad is also best with some of the unique potatoes you can get from your local farmers’ market or that you may grow in your own garden (maybe I’ll do that next year).

The dressing is creamy but light and fresh; not cloying like many the many mayonnaise-based potato salads I am not a fan of.

And, of course, summer is the time for eating outside and grilling things on the bbq. This salad goes great with carne asada, grilled steak tacos, or pretty much anything else cooked over a flame!

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients:

1 large poblano pepper
2 pounds potatoes
1 knob onion or a couple of green onions

Dressing:
1/4 cup plain, low-fat greek yogurt
1/2 roasted poblano pepper (you only need 1 pepper in total for the salad and dressing)
1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1 tbsp olive oil
1 garlic clove roasted
2 tbsp chopped chives
2 tbsp chopped cilantro
2 tbsp chopped parsley
juice of half a lime
salt and pepper

Roast the poblanos. If you have a bbq or gas stove, char the skin over the flame. If you have an electric stove, put it under the broiler for 10-15 minutes turning it so all sides get charred. (Get your little garlic clove into this action as well to roast and sweeten it up).

Put the hot peppers in a bowl, cover them with a tea towel, and let them sit/steam for 10 minutes or more. The skin should now come off easily when you rub it. Remove as much of the skin as you can then cut out the stem and seed. Rinse it to get all the black stuff off and remove the final few stubborn seeds.

Then roughly slice or chop half of the poblano to use for the dressing and more finely chop the other half to use directly in the salad.

To make the dressing, put the roughly chopped poblano half as well as all the other ingredients into a blender or food processor and waz it up. Check for salt. It should be a pleasingly light green, fresh, smooth dressing. Personally, I could just eat this dressing straight up, it’s so amazing.

Meanwhile, cut the potatoes into one-inch cubes and boil until fork tender in salted water. Drain.

Place the hot potatoes in a bowl with the finely chopped poblano and green onion. Dress the potatoes while they’re still hot as it really helps them absorb all the gorgeous flavour. You can eat it warm or refrigerate for a couple of hours if you prefer it cold.

Marinated flank steak quickly seared on the bbq with the creamy poblano potato salad and "solar flare" heirloom tomatoes: summer eating at its best.

6 Weight Watcher smart points per serving (using less olive oil will bring your points down a bit)

© Gail J. Cohen 2016