A Baker's Shortcut Puff Pastry

 One of the tastiest and most elegant of dishes to serve is a puff pastry tart. Savory or sweet, it's a nice classy way to have vegetables, meats or fruit. The only problem is making the crust. never fear. That's where the frozen kind comes into play.

Melissa Clark wrote about the joy of it in yesterday's New York Times Food section. Home bakers can make the crust at home. The basic recipe is just a good French or culture butter, cold water  and flour. However making a dough from these can be labor intensive and time consuming. A store bought one is a godsend. It cuts down on everything and you can concentrate on the fillings. Ms. Clark recommends tracking down a good brand (some swear by Trader Joe's). Most packages of it usually comes out around the Christmas holidays so you could stock up on it then for Spring and summer baking. Once out of the freezer it does need to thaw out for about  three six hours in the fridge where it will keep for a week. If you're pressed fro time. let it thaw out on  a metal sheet and turn it over every fifteen minutes. AVOID the microwave..It will melt some areas of the pastry into sticky puddles while other parts rigid and frozen. Cook all the fruits and veggies before topping. This eliminates moisture from seeping onto the buttery layers and remember to spread only two to four cups of them. 

Ms. Clark gives two fillings, The first is a veggie one with your choice of veggies. For a true Gallic one , thinks leeks and onions. You could also skip the leeks and add sliced and cooked  cherry tomatoes.Broccoli and broccolini also are great toppings. One just with eggplant is another yummy choice or you could go with all root vegetables.There is first a layer of creme fraiche mixed with egg, Parmesan, lemon zest or rosemary and garlic. Shredded Gruyere can also be added. Rosemary springs top it and then it's baked for twenty to twenty five minutes in a 425 degree F. oven. The sweet version can have all sorts of toppings from strawberry and rhubarb - in season right now to any kind of berry. Peaches are also good. Roasted Demerara sugar is used as is the granulated kind. This last is mixed in with cornstarch and salt to be added to the cut fruit along with lemon juice honey and vanilla. The dough should be rolled out on the roasted and cooled Demerara sugar. The fruit should be given one final toss to dissolve any honey that may have clumped. Sprinkled Demerara sugar over the entire filled tart The tart should be baked for thirty to forty minutes or until the crust is golden in a 400 degree F oven . 

A puff pastry tart is the perfect dinner or dessert. Just buy a frozen crust to make it easier. The result is a hassle free taste of classiness.

Welcome To The Times

The New York Times Food section has a brand new writer and a  brand new column. Allison Roman is the newest member of the family.  Like her coworkers, she  will give readers and foodies
 good recipes and excellent information. Also like them, she knows food and will undoubtedly give us all good advice easy weekday and weekend cooking.

Who is Allison Roman and why is she worthy of writing for The Times?  She has contributed to the Food section in the past along with being the author of the cookbook, Dining In. Highly Cookable Recipes. which reflects American cooking and our changing tastes. She's also the former food editor at Bon Appetit and Buzzfeed magazines. She had also contributed to Cherry Bombe,Darling and the former Lucky Peach. - various  magazines catering to the trendy and hungry. Her first cookbook, Lemons was a mini book centering on just lemon recipes., her favorite ingredient. Her new column will be sort of like what Pierre Franey, the great Franco-American chef once wrote for the newspaper.. Every recipe will only take a home chef an hour to whip up. Her first article is a homage to her mother - a one pan affair that  pairs butterflied trout with  garlic laced broccolini.For Ms. Roman it's basically unfussy cooking with little effort and few ingredients.

Minimalist cooks will like this recipe.Butterflied trout can easily be bought at your local fishmonger's  (it's not fully deboned - only the spine and larger bones are removed). She points out that it's better to cook the whole fish than just fillets. Doing such will greatly reduce the risk of the fish from being overcooked. A larger piece also buys the home chef time in the oven. That means a side dish can also be cooked at the same time alongside the trout. For this sheet pan dinner, Ms. Roman uses broccolinii. because it crisps up nicely in the oven. Other veggies such as boiled and crushed potatoes, stripped leaves of kale,or halved cherry tomatoes  can also be used. She tells home chefs that they can make ir as simple or as complicated as they wish. Scatter a few slices of lemon over the trout, drizzle olive oil and then sprinkle with salt and pepper. The fish is placed in the center of the sheet , covered with lemon slices.The broccolini is then  placed around it and then drizzled with olive oil. Garlic gives it more flavor as do capers - which you can omit if you 're not into them.

No doubt that Alison Roman will leave her mark on The New York Times Food section. Home chefs will love her no fuss meals that can be made in less than an hour. She will definitely have a following.