savory roasted onion tart (quiche)

Last November, I was invited to a Chantal Guillon macaron party hosted by my friend Anita from Dessert First. It was such a fun party! We got to drink champagne, eat macarons all night, and we were even invited into the kitchen to fill and decorate macarons as well! 

While I was there I met a few fellow food bloggers, which led to following a few new people on Instagram as well, including Brenda from Bites and Bourbon. Fast forward several months, and I happened to see a beautiful roasted onion tart on Brenda's Instagram feed, which I instantly knew that I HAD to make!

In her post, Brenda mentioned that the recipe was from Edible Cleveland, so I looked it up and found it here! It starts with pie crust, fitted into a 9-inch pie pan and then blind baked at 375F for 20-25 minutes.

For the onions, I chose a yellow onion as well as a purple one, so that the color would stand out and make the tart pretty. The onions are first roasted before being added to the tart, to give it a nice caramelized onion flavor. After being drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper, they were roasted on the top rack of the oven while the pie crust baked on the bottom rack.

In the meantime, I made the filling, which was so simple! Eggs, thyme, milk, and salt. And cheese of course!

Once the pie crust was baked and cooled slighly, I added the filling...

... and carefully decorated the top with the beautiful roasted onion slices. Who knew onion slices could make such a pretty pattern!

Then the whole thing went back in the oven for 45-50 minutes until the filling set.

Mmmmmmm ....

I must say, this tart was delicious!!! It would be perfect for breakfast/brunch, lunch, or even dinner (which is when we ate it!). Or even just as a snack. :)

 

 Thanks for introducing me to this recipe, Brenda!

french onion and bacon tart

I saw this recipe for french onion and bacon tart from America's Test Kitchen, and my mouth started watering.  So I had to make it.  It's kind of like a quiche, but it doesn't have as many eggs as a quiche would have.

For the pie crust, I used my favorite all-butter pie crust recipe, and pressed it into a 9-inch tart pan with removable bottom. I didn't have any pie weights for the blind baking, so instead I used mung beans, the only dried beans that I could find in the house.  (Sorry mom, these were the beans you brought to my house to make soup with!)

Next up was frying up some bacon. Yum!  Of course I had to snack on a few, because who can resist crispy, salty, delicious bacon when it's on a plate right infront of you!

Then, I added sliced onions and fresh thyme to the pan with the rendered bacon fat, seasoned it, and let it cook until the onions were nice and caramelized.

After letting the onions cool slightly, I combined them with a mixture of eggs and half-and-half, and then poured them into my baked tart shell.  The final step was topping the whole thing with the crispy bacon (what was left of the bacon, that is).

Then I put it in the oven and baked it at 375 F for about 25 minutes until it was set.  I let it cool for a bit, and then unmolded it from the tart pan.

I have to say, this recipe makes one delicious savory tart.  The combination of flavors and textures is heavenly - flaky buttery crust, combined with sweet caramelized onions and creamy eggs, and crispy salty bacon to top it all off!  And the best part is that you could have it for breakfast, lunch, or dinner!