Tomato, pesto and goat’s cheese tart
A delicious tomato pesto and goats cheese tart recipe from The Little Book of Lunch. A really simple vegetarian tart dish with vibrant colours and flavours.
Introduction
Recipe from The Little Book of Lunch.
Ingredients
| 1/3 sheet | ready-rolled puff pastry |
| 1 tsp | pesto |
| 1 | tomato, sliced |
| handful of mild goat’s cheese, crumbled | |
| ½ tsp | dried thyme |
| milk, for brushing the pastry edges | |
| green salad, to serve | |
| For the salad dressing: | |
| ½ tbsp | extra-virgin olive oil |
| splash of red wine vinegar | |
| 1 tsp | Dijon mustard |
| salt and freshly ground black pepper |
Method
As with the pissaladière, preheat the oven to 200°C/gas 6 and take the puff pastry out of the fridge. Remove it from its packaging but wait at least 10 minutes before unrolling it.
Meanwhile prepare the other ingredients: wash and pack your green salad, and prepare the salad dressing in a small Tupperware or mini jam jar. Nestle the dressing container into your salad container like a Russian doll.
Carefully unroll a section of the sheet of puff pastry and using scissors, cut the section away from the rest of the roll, through the pastry and the paper, the same way you would cut off a piece of wrapping paper. Keep the rectangle of pastry on the paper it came on. Now, choose the receptacle that you are going to use to transport the tart (square or rectangular Tupperware would be ideal) and place it face down on the pastry. Using a sharp knife cut around the tin, discarding the extra pastry. Fold over each of the sides of the pastry by 1 cm (going towards the inside), so that you create a ridged edge around the outside of the tart. Transfer your tart to a baking tray, and prick the base with a fork – this will stop the middle bit rising. You want the edges to rise to create a crust so don’t prick those.
Coat the base with 1 teaspoon of pesto and layer the tomato slices on top. Crumble over a generous amount of goat’s cheese and sprinkle over the thyme.
Brush the edges of the pastry with milk, and bake for 12 minutes, until the pastry is crisp and a dark gold. It should fit perfectly in the Tupperware container you used to cut its contour.
Come lunchtime
Pour the dressing over your salad. The tart is delicious both reheated and at room temperature.
Leftover ratatouille or roasted vegetables of any kind are delicious on puff pastry tarts. Simply spoon over the cooked vegetables (e.g. roasted courgettes, aubergines, carrots even), crumble over some feta and bake as directed above. Delicious and oh so easy.
