Honey caramelized carrots with goat cheese and thyme are tucked into a skillet beneath a layer of pastry dough and baked to create a beautiful upside down tart.
By Eva Lambooij
I recently discovered the joy of tarte tatin. 
Now I hear you thinking, you live in France half the time, how could you have missed tarte tatin?? Well, I didn’t miss it, I’ve ordered it many times for dessert when eating out. But, that’s always a tarte tatin with apple. The classic so to say. A very tasty classic (they don’t become classics for no reason!), but not a very interesting for me one as far as cooking goes. I was perfectly happy with eating a slice once in a while in restaurants.
That was until I made a tarte tatin with prunes, and fell in love with how the fruit caramelized (what can I say? it’s caramel!) on the bottom of the tin. Combined with sweet, crusty dough was pure bliss. So we ate the whole (!!) pie the same day. 2 people, 1 pie, 1 day….That’s how good it was.
And so I started thinking, what if I used the same principle (caramelizing something on the bottom of the tin, covered in pastry) for a savoury tarte tatin? Like, let’s say, a tarte tatin with carrots and goat cheese?
Carrots (with honey) caramelize just as delicious as their fruity counterparts. The goat cheese, thyme and puff pastry made sure it stayed a savoury pie, perfect for lunch or dinner. I like to serve this tarte tatin with a big green salad, for balance in flavor (a sour vinaigrette works well with the sweetness of the carrots).
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Caramelized Carrot and Goat Cheese Tarte Tatin
Description
Caramelized carrots with goat cheese and thyme are tucked into a skillet beneath a layer of pastry dough and baked to create a beautiful upside down tart.
Ingredients
- Carrots, 6, scraped and cut in half, lengthwise (you want to keep the full length of the carrots)
- Butter, 50 gr (1/4 cup)
- Honey, 1 tsp
- Salt, pinch
- Goat cheese, 30 gr (1/8 cup) + a bit extra to garnish
- Fresh thyme leaves, 1 tsp + extra to garnish
- Puff pastry, 1 roll of ready to use pastry
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 200 C / 390 F
- Place the halved carrots in a mould (traditionally a round one)
- Melt the butter in a pan, on low heat
- Add the honey and the salt, leave to boil for two minutes
- Pour over the carrots
- Crumble the goat cheese over the carrots and sprinkle with thyme
- Take the pastry and place in on top, it must fully cover the carrots
- Tuck it in, like a blanket, if you have to much excess pastry, cut it off with a knife
- Using a fork, punch a few holes in the pastry (to let the hot steam escape) and bake for 30 minutes
- Take out of the oven, let cool off a bit and gently turn the mould over to release the pie
- Garnish with fresh thyme and some extra goat cheese
- Category: Side
- Cuisine: French
