"Never be afraid to add plenty of butter," my mother says. She doesn't use scales but always gets it just right. Free-form tarts, of course, can be filled with any selection of delicious flavour. For mine I have used spinach and ricotta with a hint of blue cheese. These are always great to serve for lunch when my mum and sisters come for lunch.
Pastry
| 200 g | Flour |
| 100 g | Butter |
| 1 tsp | Salt |
| 1 | Egg, yolk |
| 2 Tbsp | Water, cold |
Filling
| 200 g | Spinach, wilted (Main) |
| 2 | Spring onions, sliced thinly |
| 250 g | Ricotta cheese (Main) |
| 2 | Eggs |
| ¼ cup | Parmesan cheese, grated |
| 40 g | Blue cheese, crumbled |
| 1 | Egg, yolk, to glaze pastry |
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Directions
- To make the pastry, place the flour, butter and salt into the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolk and water and mix until a firm dough. Wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- Preheat oven to 180C.
- To make the filling, in a large bowl combine the spinach, onions, ricotta, eggs, parmesan, salt and plenty of ground pepper.
- Roll the pastry on a lightly floured bench into a 30cm circle. Place onto an oven tray.
- Spoon the filling into the centre of the pastry leaving a 2cm border. Fold the edges in onto the filling, around the entire circle. Crumble the blue cheese over the filling. Brush the pastry with the egg yolk.
