French tarts with leeks and onions – Vegetarian

I have a French cookbook, and I’ve been meaning to try this recipe for a while, especially since I had already made the onion soup from it, which turned out ab-so-lute-ly delicious.
So, a few days ago, I finally bought all the ingredients and got started on these Alsatian Onion Tartlets, as they’re called in the book.

Ingredients:

• 3–4 tablespoons of flour
• 6 onions (I used shallots, but you can use any type of onion you have on hand)
• 4 large leeks
• 3 eggs
• a few sprigs of fresh thyme (or dried, if fresh isn’t available)
• 5 garlic cloves
• 100 g butter
• 100 g gorgonzola cheese
• 500–600 g sour cream
• 1 sheet of puff pastry
• dried oregano
• salt + pepper

Preparation:

Let the puff pastry defrost completely.
Wash the leeks and slice them into rounds.
Peel the onions, cut them in half, then slice them thinly.
Peel the garlic cloves and slice them finely.
Cut the gorgonzola into small chunks.

In half of the butter, sauté the onions until softened. Once they begin to turn translucent, add the remaining butter along with the sliced leeks and garlic. Cook for a few more minutes, stirring occasionally, until everything is nicely softened. Season with salt and pepper, but go easy on the salt, as the cheese we’ll be adding later is already quite salty.

Add the sour cream to the pan and stir well to combine. Sprinkle in the flour and mix thoroughly to avoid any lumps. Once everything is well incorporated, remove from the heat and let the mixture cool.

Prepare your baking tins – I used 12 small tartlet molds, but if you don’t have individual forms, you can skip the next few steps and simply use a deep baking tray or a large round tart pan; both work just as well.

Preheat the oven to 170°C (340°F).

Meanwhile, roll out the puff pastry on a floured surface. Using a glass, cut out 12 circles of dough. Place one circle into each tart mold and gently press it down into the base using your fingers to form a crust.

While we were prepping the tart molds, the filling had time to cool, so it’s now safe to add the eggs and the finely chopped fresh thyme.

Spoon about 2 heaping tablespoons of filling into each tart shell, then add 2 small pieces of gorgonzola on top. Finish with a light sprinkle of dried oregano. Repeat this process for each tartlet. (I had a bit of leftover pastry, so instead of throwing it away, I cut out a few little hearts and used them to decorate the tartlets.)

Place the tartlets in the preheated oven and bake for about 20 minutes, or until the tops are nicely golden and slightly crisp.

These tartlets are absolutely delicious—perfect for lunch or dinner, and truly a treat for the senses. I wholeheartedly recommend giving them a try. Despite their fancy name, they’re surprisingly easy to make and use simple, accessible ingredients. I won’t say more about how amazing they are, I’ll let you discover that for yourselves!

If you try the recipe, let me know how you liked it! 😊

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