Tomato Tarte Tatin

My roommate came home with a 5" cast iron skillet a few weeks ago. He was geeked about tarte tatins, French upside-down caramelized apple tarts, and variations on that theme. He bought apples. He bought pears. He bought tomatoes and thyme. The following recipe was what we put together this morning, taken from a NY Times article from last September.

So, this is our election day. Sleeping in, a leisurely breakfast, catching up with the news, and playing around with a new recipe. There were no lines at the polls, despite all the news reports that said otherwise. The weather is oddly warm for November 4th- no jacket required, and everything is warm toned from the sun falling through the yellow leaves that are still hanging from the trees. This caramelized tomato tart, in all it's flavor complexity, was fitting for today.

Caramelized Tarte Tatin
from 9/17/08 NY Times, Melissa Clark


1 sheet of Puff pastry dough, either home made or store bought.
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 red onions, halved and thinly sliced
1/4 cup plus a pinch of sugar
1/2 teaspoon sherry vinegar
1/4 cup chopped pitted Kalamata olives
1 1/2 pints (about 1 pound) cherry or grape tomatoes; a mix of colors is nice
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
Kosher salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste.

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Unfold puff pastry sheet and cut into a 10-inch round; chill, covered, until ready to use.
2. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onions and a pinch of sugar and cook, stirring, until onions are golden and caramelized, 15 to 20 minutes. Add 2 tablespoons water and let cook off, scraping brown bits from bottom of pan. Transfer onions to a bowl.
3. In a clean, ovenproof 9-inch skillet, combine 1/4 cup sugar and 3 tablespoons water. Cook over medium heat, swirling pan gently (do not stir) until sugar melts and turns amber, 5 to 10 minutes. Add vinegar and swirl gently.
4. Sprinkle olives over caramel. Scatter tomatoes over olives, then sprinkle onions on. Season with thyme leaves, salt and pepper. Top with puff pastry round, tucking edges into pan. Cut several long vents in top of pastry.
5. Bake tart until crust is puffed and golden, about 30 minutes. Let stand for 5 minutes, then run a knife around pastry to loosen it from pan, and flip tart out onto a serving platter. Cut into wedges and serve immediately.

Cornman Farms

Tuesday morning I headed out to Cornman Farms, Chef Alex Young's ever-growing farming operation out in Dexter, Michigan. During producing months it supplies the Roadhouse Restaurant with mouthwatering heirloom tomatoes, cucumbers, potatoes and a whole host of other bounty. It was a year ago this month that I first went out there, to help plant tomatoes and peppers with a few friends. He's expanded his farming area this year (his fourth in operation), and built a hoop garden to get a head start.





The 'hoop' is a metal frame with a plastic covering that can be raised or lowered on each side. It keeps plants a bit warmer and protects them from the wind, so you can put your young plants in the ground a few weeks earlier and not have to worry about them being damaged from early spring frosts. It also means that he'll have tomatoes ready to eat about 2-4 weeks earlier this year.


My friend Jess Piskor from the Deli has been working with Alex on the farm on a part time basis- he helped install the hoop structure (which wasn't as easy as it seems), and by the end of the day on Tuesday helped get several hundred tomato plants in the ground.


Talking with Mark and Alex is always facinating in that they're so knowledgable about how it all ties together. For example, they started the season by putting down a 'green manure' which has several different plant seeds mixed in. Two of which are legumes (but no the bean producing type), which draw nitrogen up from the soil. The nitrogen stays attached to the plants root structure, and after tilling and preping the lot for planting, provides essential nutrients that the plants will need. In most commercial farming operations, nitrogen and other nutrients are applied topically, since the soil is so stripped from lack of plant diversity.