Cuisine – Time for tarts

A good cook often has dozens of cookbooks on the shelves in the kitchen and yet strangely, will rarely stray beyond the very favourite two or three that are tried and true. It is often said that even the best cooks only need a repertoire of between 25 and 30 recipes. When the internet is crammed with advice and often untested recipes, some of those can be a disaster.

But once a technique or style of cooking has been mastered, it’s great to use inspiration to get cooking and change out those favourites. Right now the tomatoes are ripening daily, herbs are growing prolifically and it’s hard to keep up with courgettes that seem to turn to marrows in a blink. And tarts are so easy to make, especially if you use a prepared pastry. Try to make tarts, whether savoury or sweet, part of your repertoire, especially now when tomatoes (savoury) or stone fruit (sweet) are in abundance.

For my recipe this week, I was inspired by my little garden, which only has three tomato plants and two courgette bushes this year, but plenty of herbs that should see me through to Easter. And I delved into a little-used but wonderful cookbook written in the year 2000 by Tamasin Day-Lewis, The Art of the Tart. I was tickled to read the inscription thanking me for her “magical stay at Omaha”. I can’t remember what we ate together but I do have memories of her running the length of the sandy beach, a bit like Nigel Havers in Chariots of Fire!

Tamasin has several tarts with fresh tomatoes in that book, so I took ideas from a couple of them, combined them to make this tart, and was excited about the result. I used a little camembert cheese from Puhoi, but you could use any other brie or camembert or even use slice of a firm feta or haloumi cheese. The tart is best served warm, but it has plenty of flavour so you could take it to a picnic or have it cool for lunch.

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Herby summer garden tart

2 sheets pre-rolled pastry (flaky puff or savoury pastry)
8 ripe tomatoes
2 courgettes
1 small round brie or Camembert (well-chilled)
1 tbsp each of chopped basil, parsley and thyme
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
100g grated Gruyere or Havarti cheese
2 tbsp olive oil
Pepper and salt to taste

Pre-heat the oven to 190C and place a baking tray in the oven to heat up too. This will help to ensure the pastry cooks on the bottom.

Take a 24cm tart tin and carefully line with the pastry, cutting excess from the edges and pricking the base with a fork. Chill this in the fridge while you prepare the vegetables and herbs.

Taking a very sharp knife, slice the tomatoes quite thinly and lay on a plate, ready to use.
Slice the courgettes as thinly as possible, laying them on a paper towel and sprinkling lightly with salt to draw excess moisture out.

Cut the wheel of cheese into about 20 little wedges.

Chop the herbs finely and place in a small bowl.

To make the tart, spread the mustard thinly completely over the base of the tart. Scatter the grated cheese evenly over the mustard. Cover with overlapping slices of tomato, courgette and brie cheese so they are arranged in a concentric circle. Fill the middle with more overlapping tomato, courgette and cheese slices until they’re all used up.

Finally scatter over the chopped herbs, sprinkle with pepper and salt and drizzle over olive oil.

Bake in the pre-heated oven, placing the tart directly on the baking sheet, for about 40 minutes until the cheese and pastry are golden brown.

Let the tart rest for about 10 minutes and serve with a crunchy green salad.

Serves 4