Balsamic Onion Mushroom Blue Cheese Tarts Recipes

BLUE CHEESE PUFF PASTRY TARTS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 200 Degrees C (390 F).
• Remove the pastry from the freezer shortly before preparing the filling.(Don't remove it too early or it will be difficult to cut neatly. The pastry will have a better texture if it is still chilled when placed in the oven.)
• Grease the patty pan tin (or muffin tin if using) well - see Note 4.
• Add the blue cheese, cream, egg, chives and freshly ground black pepper to the bowl of a food processor and blend until thoroughly mixed.
• When the pastry has just defrosted, using a 6 cm (2 ¼ inch) cookie cutter for patty pan tins or 7 ½ cm (3 inch) cutter for muffin tins, cut rounds of pastry and put into prepared muffin tin/patty pans, gently pushing the pastry down into place.You will cut 12 rounds for the patty pan or 9 for the muffin tin.
• Evenly distribute the filling between the pastry cases. This is about 1 tablespoon (4 teaspoons) for the patty pans and 1 ½ tablespoons (6 teaspoons) for the muffin tins.
• Bake in the oven for about 12 minutes in the patty pans or 12 - 15 in the muffin tins. The time will vary depending on the heat of your oven but bake until the filling puffs and becomes golden brown.
• Remove from the oven and cool for 5 minutes before removing and placing on a wire rack to cool and store - or serve warm immediately.
• If making them in advance, reheat in a pre-heated 180 degrees C (350 F) oven for 5 - 7 minutes.

FRENCH ONION AND BLUE CHEESE TART

Steps:

• Start by cooking the onions. They need to be cooked slowly on low heat, so it's best to begin with those.
• Melt the butter in a large nonstick frying pan-we have a load of onions to cook. When the butter has melted, pick off the thyme leaves and add, then add the garlic and onions. Mix everything together.
• Now add the pepper, salt, and sugar and mix. Cook on medium heat for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until you have onions that look like the kind you would only eat with a burger in a Sunday market at 6 a.m.!
• While that cooks, start on the pastry. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Line a baking sheet with some parchment paper or use the paper the pastry comes in and roll out the pastry onto the sheet.
• Using a knife, score a smaller rectangle ½ inch/1cm inside the pastry rectangle, making sure not to cut all the way through. Pierce the inner rectangle with a fork all over to allow the steam to escape when it bakes.
• Brush the edges with the egg and bake for 20 minutes, until golden all over.
• Take out and, using the back of a spoon, push down all the puffed-up pastry of the inner rectangle, creating a nice neat border.
• Take the blue cheese and crumble all over the inner rectangle of the pastry. Add the onions and scatter them all over till you have an even layer. Now bake for 15 minutes.
• Take out and let cool for 10 minutes before eating, sprinkled with the chives.

BALSAMIC ONION, MUSHROOM & BLUE CHEESE TARTS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
• Put a pan over medium heat and add 1 tablespoon olive oil and 1 tablespoon butter.
• Once the butter starts to froth, put the thinly sliced red onions in and turn the heat down to low.
• Cook, stirring often, until the onions have become translucent. This will take about 10 minutes but keep an eye on them.
• Add the sugar and the balsamic vinegar to the onions and cook on low, stirring often for about 10 minutes until the onion mixture is sticky and the liquid thickened up.
• Set the onions aside to cool.
• Melt the remaining butter in another pan and cook the mushrooms for a few minutes until they have just started to change color.
• Set the mushrooms aside to cool.
• Whilst the onions and mushrooms are cooling, layout your pie dough. You want the dough to be about as thick as a pinkie. If your pre-rolled dough is thicker roll it out to the desired thickness.
• Using a round cookie cutter or a glass, cut out 12 rounds of the dough.
• Press each round of dough into a hole of a 12 yield muffin tin. If your pan usually sticks, spray each hole with cooking spray before hand.
• Next, put the egg and sour cream into a bowl with the salt and pepper and beat together.
• Stir through the dried parsley and crumbled blue cheese. Set aside.
• Spoon a bit of the balsamic onions into the base of each tart.
• Top the onions with the mushrooms, trying to cover as much of the surface as possible.
• Spoon the blue cheese mixture over the top of each tart.
• Put tarts in the oven and bake for about 15 minutes until the pastry has gone golden and the cheese mixture has set.
• Take out of the oven and allow to cool before serving so the cheese mixture can firm up a little bit.