Monday, August 04, 2008

Onion Bread Tart

Sun 03 August 2008

This started off as an excuse to make use of the KitchenAid, but I've now discovered an excellent technique which should mean we can keep ourselves in home made bread for much of the time.

Both parts of this recipe come from Patricia Wells's At Home In Provence.

I started by making her basic bread recipe. The KitchenAid turns out to be a fantastic beast for bread making, because it turns it into a all-in-one-bowl exercise, and also removes from my hands the mucky work of incorporating flour and liquid!

So - in the bowl of your heavy duty mixer, put 1 tsp of yeast (I was using dried, active yeast), 1 tsp of sugar and add to this 11 fl oz (approximately 325mL) of warm water. Set the mixer on to its lowest setting to stir up the yeast and sugar, and then leave for the yeast to activate.

When the yeast has started its bubbling, add 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and a teaspoon of salt. Stir this, and with the mixer on, start adding 500g of strong bread flour. I add it a heaped tablespoon at a time.

Once you've added all the flour, let the mixer do the work until you have a smooth, elastic ball of dough. If, like me, you like kneading, you can pull it out earlier and knead yourself. Place the ball of dough in a large bowl, cover with cling film and leave in the fridge overnight.

To make the topping for the onion tart, take 3 or 4 large onions, slice finely and sweat in some olive oil. Add a teaspoon of salt, a teaspoon of sugar, a sprig of rosemary and a bay leaf or too. When the onions have softened and taken on some colour, add pepper to taste and leave to cool.

Preheat your oven to 230°C. Take your bread dough (preferably already brought to room temperature, but straight from the fridge is fine) and roll it out and shape it to fit a standard baking tray. If your tray is non stick, just place the dough on, stretching it out so it meets the edges. If it's not a non stick tray, grease or line with baking paper.

Mix the onion mixture with a beaten egg and a teaspoon of carraway seeds and spread over the dough, right to the edges. Bake in the hot oven for about 25 minutes - until the onions are golden and the bread is risen. Serve on its own, or with some salad, and (of course) a glass of wine.

Thanks to our enthusiastic fan oven, some of our onion came out a little darker than I would have liked, but fortunately it was not at all bitter. This was absolutely delicious and between the two of us we managed to polish off the whole thing, bar two lunch sized portions.

Of course, you may not be as greedy!

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1 Comments:

Blogger Andy said...

Don't forget to take the bay leaves and rosemary out of the onion mixture before spreading it on the bread.

9:18 am  

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