Heirloom Tomato Tarts

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If you knew me the summer I was 25, you probably ate a lot of this pie. I had just moved into a new apartment and there were nearly daily spontaneous dinner parties all summer long. I lived just 3 blocks from the bar where many of our musician friends played and literally across the street from the pub where we liked to drink and flirt with the Belfast-born barman. It became an easy habit for the gang to pile into my bijoux studio after work and grab some sustenance while makeup was reapplied and  plans of attack for the night were made.

The mostly unplanned nature of the meals and our fairly paltry paychecks at the time meant that there was lots of pasta. Until tomato season began. I had been cooking a lot from The Practically Vegetarian Cookbook by Josceline Dimbleby, a British cookery writer. When I look back at the book now, I can see there is very nearly nothing vegetarian about the book, most of the things that I made from it rather heavily involved chicken or fish. All delicious, but not quite animal free at all, which was what I was striving for. But her tomato tart was indeed vegetarian, once we omitted the anchovy, and it was nearly perfect. One of the best bits was the crust, which was more like an olive -oil infused Play-doh that got punched down into the pie plate and pieced together — no fussing, no rolling and it came together quickly enough that we were out the door in time for sound check, while still allowing me to indulge my inner Martha, creating my first home and making it a place for people to gather and be taken care of.

This tart has been on nearly constant repeat this summer as well. I’ve adapted nearly everything about this dish in the intervening years, making it simpler, fresher, quicker, but I always rely on that crust recipe as a guide: 250 grams of flour mixed with a big pinch of salt, 2 tablespoons of water and 7 tablespoons of oil. The original recipe called for infusing olive oil with 2 chopped cloves of garlic on the stove for a few minutes, which is delicious, but I’ve also used unadulterated extra-virgin olive oil, walnut oil, pistachio oil, hazelnut oil and poppyseed oil to great success. Also I often toss in a handful of grated Parmesan and/or a spoonful of pesto. I use my hands to combine the ingredients for this dough in a medium mixing bowl, gently mashing it together until all the flour is incorporated.

Using my fingers, I press pieces of dough firmly and evenly to the sides and base of 9-inch pie plate before pricking the base all over with a fork and baking in a 375 degree oven for about 25 minutes or until crust is golden and crisp at the center. And then I pile in the tomatoes. The usual impetus for me making this tart is that I have a counter full of heirlooms staring at me, so I just keep slicing and piling until I’ve reached the top, but I would say it’s about 3 good sized tomatoes or a quart of cherry or grapes tomatoes. I layer thin slices of them over the crust, overlapping like shingles. When each layer is done, it sometimes gets a sprinkle of finely grated parmesan and always some big flaked salt before I move onto the next layer. Sometimes I drizzle a little pesto in there as well, or scatter chopped herbs as I go. It goes back in the over for about 20 minutes, just until the tomatoes are warmed through, then sliced and served, although it’s also lovely at room temperature.