Tarte Flambée.

Tarte Flambée is a very famous dish from Alsace, a region in France, next to the eastern border to Germany and Switzerland. It was traditionally just for testing the heat of an oven, before baking bread. The tarte was put into the very very hot oven and it was done after about 2 minutes. Often there were some deeple browned or even burned spots and this intense baking next to the flames gave it the name “tarte flambée”, which basically means “tart baked in flames”.

The dough is quite similar to a pizza dough, but it’s usually made without any oil.

It can be topped in a lot of different way, but the traditional alsatian way is crème fraîche, onions and fatty pork bacon. Crème fraîche, apples, sugar and cinnamon is also a very tasty way to enjoy it as a dessert. I like the traditional recipe with some cheese added.

Ingredients

1 cube fresh yeast (or a small package of instant dry yeast)
1 1/4 cup lukewarm water
4 cups of flour
2 tsp. of salt
1 tsp. of sugar

1 cup of crème fraîche or sour cream
1 cup of grated cheese (i like emmentaler)
1 large onion, thinly sliced
1/4 pound of bacon, chopped

salt & pepper

Mix water, sugar and yeast in a small bowl and let stand for about 5 minutes in a warm place. Add flour and salt to a big bowl and slowly incorporate yeast mixture. Knead until smooth and let rise in a warm place for about 40 minutes.

Preheat oven to 450 degree or even hotter. Roll out dough very thin and top with (in this order) crème fraîche/sour cream, a handful of cheese, some onion slices, some bacon and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Bake for about 10 Minutes or until lightly browned. Slice and serve while still really hot.