Valley Bounty: Savory Tarts

At a New Year’s Brunch, I enjoyed a spread of tarts featuring winter staple vegetables. We had an egg, nut, and butternut squash tart, one filled with squash and caramelized onion, and one featuring roasted parsnips and apples, plus a crustless potato, beet and cheese tart.  Making your own tart crust is simple, but you can also substitute a frozen pie crust or phyllo dough. A visit to Winter Fare, CISA’s annual celebration of locally grown food available in the cold months, is another way to revitalize your winter menu. You’ll find workshops, music and fun at area farmers markets: Saturday at the Northampton market at Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School, Jan. 24 at the Amherst market at the Amherst Regional Middle School.

– Margaret Christie of Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA).

Extras:

Winter Fare Details here.
Winter Farmers’ Market Locations here.

Tart Recipes:

The Apple Parsnip Galette towards the bottom of this NPR Kitchen Window piece on Savory Tarts is especially good—you could also just eat the roasted apple parsnip filling as is. I skipped the hazelnuts in the crust and just used a pie crust recipe. Above it, there’s a recipe for a Pumpkin Seed Sage Tart With Butternut Squash Coins which is also good.

I’ve made this Roasted Squash and Caramelized Onion galette from Smitten Kitchen more than once.

My crustless Potato Beet Tart was not as beautiful as the one pictured here, but it was delicious. Next time I might use less cheese.