LouLou's Onion Roquefort Tart

                  

I'm not a fan of blue cheese...really never liked it.  When we were in France in September we ate at a restaurant in the beautiful village of Najac called Le Belle Rive .  We had an amazing dinner.  For dessert we had a cheese plate with many different cheeses.  One of them was Roquefort.  We learned that this cheese is made in the village of Roquefort.  Roquefort is at least one of the oldest and best known in the world. This blue cheese has been enjoyed since Roman times and was a favorite of Charlemagne. It is made from sheep's milk that is exposed to a mold known as Penicillium roqueforti and aged for 3 months or more in the limestone caverns of Mount Combalou near the village of Roquefort in southwestern France. This is the only place true Roquefort can be aged. Roquefort has a creamy-rich texture and pungent, piquant, somewhat salty flavor. It has a creamy white interior with blue veins and a snowy white rind. It's sold in squat foil-wrapped cylinders. True Roquefort can be authenticated by a red sheep on the wrapper's emblem. The name "Roquefort" is protected by law from imitators of this remarkable cheese.

When they put this cheese in front of us we were truly amazed to see how furry it was.  Being from America, we are not used to eating furry molded cheese.  Most people would throw away cheese that has mold on it.  I just cut it off (but don't tell Bruce).  Bruce took the smallest morsel of this cheese and put it in his mouth - he said it was like a rush to his head, it cleared his sinuses and he felt it all the way to the top of his head.  He has never experienced that before with any cheese.  It tried a small taste but it was too strong for me.

I read this lovely blog called Cuisine Quotidienne.  Betty writes this blog as well as  La France Profonde She is a native of Olympia, Washington, and has been living, working, cooking and raising a family in France for 17 years.  I was reading her blog a couple weeks ago and she had just made this tart.  She got the recipe from Chez Loulou .  I decided to make it for Bruce and I.

I'm not going to give the whole recipe here...click on the Chez Loulou link for it, I will give you some pictures of it though.  I tried to make the crust, since we don't have the "good" pastry crust you can buy in France.  The crust didn't work out well for me, not sure if it was the measurements.  I would use puff pastry or make a traditional crust, either would work really well.  You can see how to make the puff pastry from my post for Goat cheese tart.

Simple ingredients:  heavy cream, eggs, onion, butter, Parmesan cheese, and creme fraiche (sorry to those in france, I don't have the ' in creme and the circumflex for the i in fraiche).  If you want really good blue cheese, try Bristol Farms here in Los Angeles.  The selection is great.

That's some good blue cheese!!!!

Cooked onion and then the cheese on top.   The pour custard mix over, sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and bake.  This what comes out...

So I said above that I don't like blue cheese....but I loved this tart.  The custard and onions take away the sharpness of the blue and they all go together.  It's creamy, a bit tangy and smooth.  I loved it.  Can't wait to make it for some friends.  Now the bad news.  We left it up on the counter - big mistake....Dashell, the counter surfing golden retriever got up and ate the rest of the tart - we had 2 pieces for dinner, he had the rest.  He liked it too. 

Thanks Betty for a great new recipe.

Comments

[Betty C.]

Hi! I'm glad you made the tart and liked it so much. It truly is delicious. Yours looks a little different from mine, but I'm sure they were both equally good! I'll have to make another one soon...

[loulou]

So glad that you liked the tart! Anything with caramelized onions is a great dish if you ask me.
I'm not Roquefort's biggest fan either, but the flavor really mellows out when cooked and combines perfectly with the onions and Parmesan.

[Lesley]

Hi Alisa. You can contact me for the interview (hark at me!) at lesleygrah At gmail.com

[Megan]

That looks really good! I love blue cheese!