Green Vegetable Tart + Flourless Peanut Butter Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies

September 21, 2010

The last weeks of summer were filled with endless obligations and lots of quick “food for fuel” meals. Basically, not really that exciting or attractive to deserve an entire post. It has been awhile since I’ve been here, but I really have been cooking and baking – just not as much as I usually do. I did bake a savory veggie tart past weekend that turned out to be perfect with a cup of soup and a little side salad. I also found a recipe for some really great flourless peanut butter chocolate chip cookies on the Recchiuti Confections site – one of my favorite chocolate spots in San Francisco. I know, I know… the last thing we need is another chocolate chip cookie. But these cookies were so good and so quick to put together that I just decided to include them here. I cant believe I didn’t come across these sooner. Try them with almond, hazelnut, or macadamia nut butters in place of the peanut butter for a nice flavor change. I also used dark brown sugar because that is all I had and they turned out perfect – chewy and slightly crisp with a hint of molasses from the sugar.

Oh, before I forget. I want to thank Soma at e curry for reminding me that this past August was my 2 year blog anniversary. With such a busy summer it completely slipped my mind!

Thanks a bunch everyone for visiting this space and for all the great stories, recipes, and inspiration I get daily from reading your blogs.

Green Vegetable Tart

Ingredients:

Your favorite pre baked tart crust – enough for a 10 inch round or equivalent. (I used a gluten free dough combining brown rice, almond, and teff flours).

3-4 cups greens of your choice – I used a combination of rainbow chard, collards, and kale stemmed and chopped.

3/4 cup of feta – enough to fill the bottom of tart shell

1 leek, cleaned and sliced thinly

approx. 1/4 cup of chicken stock

2 garlic cloves, crushed and chopped finely

2 tbsp olive oil

1-2 eggs – depends on how much filling you use in shell

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup cream

Preheat oven to 375.

In a large pan, heat the olive oil on medium heat. Saute the leeks for a minute until fragrant and then add the garlic. Stir until garlic becomes fragrant as well. Add the greens and stir until leaves are nicely coated with oil. Stir often with tongs rotating leaves as you go for about 2-3 minutes. Add the chicken stock and let greens cook in the liquid until softened through. Season with cracked black pepper.

Add 1-2 eggs, milk, and cream in a food processor and process until a mixture becomes bubbly and custard like. I only needed 1 egg to 1 cup of liquid to fill my tart but you may need more or less depending on what size pan you are using. It’s a good idea to estimate how much custard you will need in relation to the greens.

Once your tart shell is baked and ready to go line the bottom of the shell with crumbled or sliced feta. Add the greens over the feta. Pour the custard over the top. Add a bit more cheese and sprinkle with some grated nutmeg, if you like.

Bake for about 30 minutes or until custard is set.

And here are those flourless cookies…..recipe can be found here…Enjoy!