Tartelettes à l’orange

One French Word: tartelette, a French recipe: tartelettes à l’orange

When I first worked in Paris, rue de la Glacière in the 13th arrondissement to be precise, and to be even more precise, this was almost 50 years ago, there was a pâtisserie diagonally across the road from my office. I discovered orange tarts there, and it soon became an afternoon ritual to pop out and indulge myself at tea-time! It says a lot about the relaxed working atmosphere in France at the time, that it was not considered at all unusual to leave the workplace to buy a little something to eat at (almost) any time of day.

The French language bit:

tartelette (feminine noun), une tartelette, la tartelette, les tartelettes = little tarts (of the pâtisserie kind of course!)

We looked at diminutives a couple of weeks ago, here’s another one. Une tarte is a tart, une tartelette is a little tart, a tartlet, an individual portion.

And an expression: Ce n’est pas de la tarte = (roughly) it isn’t a piece of cake, it isn’t simple

Oranges are in season in France, they are juicy and full of flavour. Here is a recipe which is a little bit different, and which could quite well grace your table around Christmas time. I advise you to take the trouble to do individual “slices”, that is, to make une tartelette for each of your family members or guests. One large tart is so difficult to cut, the orange doesn’t come apart willingly, and you are likely to mess up all your hard work.

Buy your oranges untreated if possible. In any case, wash them thoroughly because you will be using the skins. Use freshly bought oranges, not ones that have been sitting forlornly in your fruitbowl for a couple of weeks (or more…).

Home candied orange slices

Ingredients per person:

• 1  orange
• A rectangle of good quality puff pastry, made with pure butter 12cm x 20cm (about 5″ x 8″). This sounds a lot but you will be rolling the edges inwards to form a ridge all the way round.
• 1tbs of your favourite orange marmelade
• 1tbs crème pâtissière (optional but moister, see recipe below)
• 100gr sugar and a wineglass of water

Preparation:

To prepare the orange pieces:

• Wash the orange and cut into fine slices (about 3mm). Recuperate the juice. Cut each slice carefully into four quarters without tearing. It doesn’t really matter if your slices become irregular towards the end of the orange!
• Boil up the sugar with any orange juice and the water to make a syrup, put the orange pieces into this syrup, lower the heat and simmer gently, stirring regularly to ensure even coverage of the pieces, for 15 minutes or so. Do watch them so that they do not burn. They should be soft and translucent, and almost all of the syrup should have gone.

Candied orange ready to dry

• Place the orange slices with tongs on a baking sheet lined with greaseproof paper  to dry a little in the pre-heating oven. It doesn’t matter if they start to colour. Just 5 minutes. Don’t let them dry too much or they will become stiff and crunchy.

To prepare the tarts for the oven:

• Preheat the oven to 160°C.
• Cut the rectangles of puff pastry, roll the edges to form a ridge, prick with a fork, brush the edges with an egg yolk beaten with a little milk, fill with dried peas or beans and cook blind for 8-10 minutes. There is a very fine line between undercooking (the underside is not completely cooked) and overcooking (the pastry is as hard as a board). Better slightly on the undercooked side, in my opinion.

• Remove from the oven, take out the beans or peas, when cool spread the bottom of the tartlet with 1tbs marmelade, then a thin layer (about 3/4cm, 1/4″) of crème pâtissière if you are using it.
• Finish with a layer of orange slices, placed in an attractive pattern like little fans.

For the optional crème pâtissière (makes about 500ml (1 pint), so do divide the ingredients according to the number of people you are feeding.

• 500ml (1 pint) milk
• 2 eggs
• 50gr corn starch
• 60gr granulated sugar
• 1tsp freshly grated orange rind
• 1tsp vanilla powder

Place all the ingredients in a mixer and mix for 4 minutes. Pour into a saucepan and heat over a moderate flame, never ceasing to stir, until the mixture thickens. A WARNING: if you heat too fast, or stop stirring, your eggs will scramble and you can start all over again. When the mixture coats a spoon thickly, remove from the heat and allow to cool.

This cream can be used to stuff éclairs, sponge cakes or as an ingredient of ice cream. I found this recipe, which is much quicker than other recipes for crème pâtissière, here    (the site is of course in French).

Now, I didn’t use crème pâtissière, and the result was delicious, but it is definitely moister if one does add a small tablespoonful under the orange slices. The choice shall be yours!

Bon appétit!

One French word: chèvre, a French recipe: tarte au chèvre et au miel

Chèvre, masculine noun (un chèvre, le chèvre, des chèvres) = goat’s cheese (pronounced shai-vre, shai as the sha sound in shared, vre with the r pronounced in the back of your throat, tricky!).

But chèvre, feminine noun (une chèvre, la chèvre, des chèvres) = goat (pronounced in exactly the same way).

So, chèvre, the animal, is feminine (stands to reason, she gives milk to make cheese) and chèvre, the cheese, is masculine (le fromage de chèvre, abbreviated to du chèvre).

France produces a multitude of very different, very good goat’s cheeses. Words you might need to know: chèvre chaud = literally hot goat’s cheese, in other words toasted goat’s cheese; chèvre frais = fresh (soft) goat’s cheese; chèvre fermier = farmhouse goat’s cheese; chèvre fondu = melted goat’s cheese.

The little round hard goat’s cheeses are called crottin (= farm animal droppings). The long roll shaped cheeses are called bûche (= log).

Tarte au chèvre et au miel, many thanks to Jacques Vidican for his photo of the tart he did from my recipe

My recipe is for une tarte au chèvre et au miel, a honey and goat’s cheese tart. It is a main dish, but could be made in tiny portions as apéritif bites, or small individual portions as a starter.

The quality of bought puff pastry varies enormously (and no one makes their own puff pastry, no one I know anyway). Do buy the best quality available, made with pure butter.

Individual sized tarte au chèvre et au miel

For 6 people as a main dish you will need:

• one 26cm round of pre-rolled good quality puff pastry
• 1  large onion
• 1 pot of thick cream or crème fraîche
• a jar of sundried tomatoes
• 1 roll fresh goat’s cheese (for once it doesn’t have to be the finest quality, or 2 or 3 crottin cut into slices to make rounds
• 1 tbs runny honey
• salt, pepper
• a little white wine
• a little olive oil
• 1 tsp fresh thyme (optional)

Preparation:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180°C.
2. Peel and chop the onion, fry it in a tbs olive oil until it starts to colour. Add a tablespoon of dry white wine and a teaspoon of the honey and cook until caramelized.
3. Line a tart dish with the puff pastry, prick all over with a fork, and put into the hot oven for 5 minutes.
4. Spread the caramelized onion evenly over the bottom of the tart, then a layer of cream. Add salt and pepper to taste. Cut the bûche de chèvre into slices and spread them over the cream in a symmetrical pattern, leaving room in between for about 6 sundried tomatoes.
5. Drizzle the rest of the honey over the cheese (maybe avoiding too much on the tomatoes, it tends to make them burn a bit during cooking). Top with a tsp very fresh green thyme leaves if you choose to use them, but don’t use dried.

Tarte chèvre miel before cooking

Put back into the oven and cook for 20-25 minutes. Leave to cool for 5 minutes before serving. A green salad goes well with this tart. And another glass of the dry white wine you used to cook the onion. White wine goes excellently with goat’s cheese.

Two sizes of tarte au chèvre et au miel: individual and mini

Do not have the brilliant idea of substituting mozzarella for goat’s cheese should you have the one and not the other in the fridge. The mozzarella would lose a lot of water and make the whole tart soggy. Goat’s cheese is not watery. But you do not need a “great” goat’s cheese for this recipe. A standard fresh, white, soft goat’s cheese will do. Save the more expensive ones for your cheese board.

If you wish to do smaller versions as a starter, as I have done, the method is identical. Line individual size tart dishes with pastry and continue the recipe, putting a whole round of goat’s cheese in the centre of the dish and half slices of cheese and tomato alternating around the circumference. You will only need to cook these for about 12 minutes.

For apéritif mouthfuls (tartelettes), it is useful to have appropriate silicone molds.  Still prick the pastry and precook for about 4 minutes. They will puff up anyway, but just break the bubble with your thumb. Put a tiny amount of each ingredient in each tart shell and top with a little triangle of goat’s cheese. Put hardly any honey in a teaspoon, and let droplets fall on each tartlet; I’ve done a few of these too to show you how good they look! Only cook them for 5-7 minutes.

Mini tartes chèvre miel

I have just devoured a few of these for my lunch. So good, I can’t tell you!

Bon appétit.