smitten kitchen

A few times a year, I fall in love with tarts all over again, and not only because Alex thinks that “fluted removable bottom tart pan” is the best name given to any kitchen tool, ever, but because there are few things not made tastier when rendered wide and shallow, in a flower-like shell. In the winter, I gush over slices of warm quiche, on a plate billowing with lightly-dressed greens, or a deep, rich, hard-to-forget ganache tartlet but in the summer, its fresh fruit or bust.

This past weekend not one but two tarts exited my kitchen in a new Envirosax tote bag, both entirely inspired by the city of Paris. The first headed for my friend Molly’s dinner party on Friday night, a take on the classic tarte au citron (lemon tart) so fabulous, I might never make stove-top curd citrus curd again. I’ve mentioned before an ongoing fascination with “whole citrus” recipes, those that know that the whole shebang–from peel to pith to pulp–smartly leveraged in a dish is infinitely more satisfying that those that just go for the more low-hanging ingredient of juice. This entire tart is made with one single lemon, ground to a pulp with sugar, then mixed with egg, melted butter and cornstarch and seared in a par-baked crust until the top is bubbly and the taste is absolutely worth bragging about. The simplicity of ingredients alone makes it worthwhile, but the grown-up flavor with the bitter, fragrant vibe straight from the lemon’s edge makes it ready for its close-up. I can’t wait to make it next with two key limes, half a ruby red grapefruit or a whole orange.

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When I first saw a recipe for a Lemon Confit Shortbread Tart in Wednesday’s New York Times, I was still too deep in my cooking-failure funk to consider trying my hand with it, although I did say out loud and to nobody in particular, “Well, doesn’t that look nice?” But when making weekend plans with my parents and my mother told me that she’d seen some lemon tart in the paper and really wanted to make it, I knew it was destiny, and secretly rejoiced that it would be someone else coughing up for nine lemons.

And what’s not to love? Shortbread, double-crusts, Mom’s ancient fluted tart pan and lemons, from pulp to pith and peel all sound sounded so irresistible. I have been absorbed with this “whole lemon” cooking concept since I made a sorbet last summer that involved exactly that, ground with sugar, and frozen with pureed fresh strawberries. It’s the best recipe to have graced my ice-cream maker to date.

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Just a few days after returning from our honeymoon, Alex and I celebrated our two-year dating anniversary — which just seems now the most precious thing, celebrating ever teensy weensy moment that passes; oh, how married we’ve become — by going to DB Bistro for dinner. Though I never thought we could have a bad time anywhere, we really, really did not enjoy the meal; the waiter rushed us, I could have sworn one made a face when I opted for two appetizers and a side instead of an entrée, we were squeezed in like sardines next to possibly the most annoying female half of a couple, ever, and oh, a plate was whisked away from me before I was done. Meh! A few days later, I did something I had not done before or since, and wielded my mighty pen, drafting off a full-paged To Whom It May Concern, expressing as diplomatically as I could that I think we are the least fussy diners, ever, but were still sorely disappointed. Two days later, the manager called me, personally apologizing and inviting us back for a free champagne cocktail or some such; a few days after that, a signed letter from Mr. Boulud arrived backing up this offer. Very gracious, indeed, though I can’t say we’ve ever taken them up on this.

Onwards! I’d completely forgotten about this meal until browsing Eat and then Lobstersquad a couple days ago, both of whom had made tomato tarte tatins, something I’d ordered and absolutely loved at DB that night, and had sworn I’d try my hand at one day. Ignoring the fact that it is presently the opposite of tomato season and also that I’ve never made a classic tarte tatin before (though I will, very soon), I decided to follow my intuition (always a scary thing) and make what I approximated to be a similar version of it. Charmed by both the stellar quality of the canned, whole and utterly flawless San Marzano tomatoes we’ve had the luck to bring home lately, as well as the roasting-toasting step in the tomato soup I made a while back to bring out their flavor, I opted for the canned variety. Discarding their innards as gently as I could, I cooked them on the stove for a good 20 minutes in a big pat of butter with a pinch of sugar and a much larger one of salt, cooking off a lot of their liquid, then covered them with sliced coins of chèvre and a round of puffed pastry. Following Molly’s wonderful tatin instructions, I baked it for about 45 minutes until puffy and golden, inverting it a few minutes later on a plate.

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Come on, be honest. Is there anything better than a homemade quiche? I could eat it with a pile of baby greens for dinner every night of the week. Or lunch, brunch or a post-gym snack. Is there anything more versatile? Oddly enough, I didn’t have a proper quiche pan until yesterday, when a trip to my beloved Bowery Kitchen Supply put me face-to-face with one for ten bucks. (Alex’s favorite kitchen name, ever, is Fluted Removable-Bottom Tart Pan, followed by Reamer. What, you didn’t know I was married to a twelve-year-old?) I was actually there to get my knives sharpened (mwa-ha-ha, it sounds so sinister, right?) and to look at pasta-makers (this excitement for later, but yes, I can barely contain myself, too), and within 2.5 seconds, I knew we were having quiche for dinner.

Unable to decide between Julia Child’s leek quiche and her mushroom variety, I opted instead to use a little of both. She suggests you braise the leeks for 30 minutes with a little butter, water and salt and you should listen to her. Remember those brown-braised pearl onions from the coq a vin? Well, they’ve got competition. She has you cook mushrooms in a way I haven’t before, but it will now be my go-to method for sautéed mushrooms because it was divine: a pat of butter, a pinch of salt and a tablespoon of port, cooked low with the lid on for eight minutes. How does she do that? How does she take something you’ve done your whole life and convince you each time you could have been doing it better because they’ve never tasted this good?

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Over the years, I’ve made endless desserts for family gatherings: orange-chocolate bundt cakes, flourless chocolate cakes, chocolate caramel cheesecakes, bourbon-pumpkin cheesecakes, apple pies, peach pies, fruit crisps and crumbles, fresh fruit tarts, lemon bundts, but the only things that our families simply never shut up about in the days, months and years after are those that specialize in cocoa. Thus, for our Hanukah dinner I figured I’d cut out the middle men, so to speak — the flour, the baking powder, fruits and cheese — and just give people the big old pile of chocolate they want, namely in the form of Robert Linxe’s Chocolate Tart in Dorie Greenspan’s wonderful Paris Sweets.

Have I ever mentioned my love of Robert Linxe? He’s the man behind the unparalleled La Maison du Chocolat shops, and look, if you’re going to eat just one piece of chocolate before you die, might I insist that it be one of his plain truffles? Sure, they’re about $2.50 each, less than an inch in diameter, and not in any way laced in gold or diamonds, but there is no greater format for chocolate intake than these little cocoa dusted, crackly exterior-ed bits of the heavens above. Back when I had a roommate whose boyfriends liked to shower her with absurdly priced gifts, one suitor brought her a 1-lb box and I’m not sure my relationship with chocolate has been the same since. (In all honesty, I’ve had his original recipe bookmarked for years but I’ve been too intimidated to approach a recipe with such lofty expectations.)

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