I made pissaladiere for the first time this week. It was pretty good -- not transcendent, but pretty good. I read a bunch of recipes but ended up using no particular version.
For the crust I used my standard no-rolling-pin recipe from the Joy of Cooking. Like you, I don't really get flaky pie crust; I feel the crumbly pat-in-the-pan versions are just as good any other crust I've had. Anyway: 1.5 cups flour, 5 T butter, and about 3/4 t salt -- more than the recipe calls for.
I put two beaten eggs and some grated Parmesan in the bottom of the crust to seal it and hold everything together. On top of that I put a whole bunch of caramelized Vidalia onions -- two medium onions reduced to a dark gold color. Next came four anchovies, broken up; a teaspoon or so each of fresh basil, rosemary, and oregano; and two medium tomatoes, one chopped and drained and one sliced. On top of that was a bit more Parmesan and some oil-cured olives. I baked the whole thing for about half an hour.
I'd like to know Aunt Katherine's pissaladiere recipe. If she doesn't see this post, maybe you can ask her when you see her next week to put it in the comments or send to us.
4 comments:
Eva,
I was very interested in reading the recipe you used. I had not seen one
similar to that.
The recipe I used is from the Cook's Magazine. It calls for a pretty
traditional pizza dough shaped in a rectangle about 8x14 inches. The dough
was topped with carmalized onions, anchovies and nicoise olives. That was
it.
It was good, but not nearly as good as I expected. It sounded interesting
because it was billed as a Provencal street food.
Whenever I make or even read anything from Cook's Magazine I roll my eyes.
In this recipe the poor author was beset by several aspects of this
Pissaladiere. She wrote an entire paragraph about the curse of round
olives. They roll off her pizza! If she cut them in half she felt they got
a bit leathery so she came up with this Nobel Peace Prize winner - put them
under the onions!
I think she needs a glass of wine.
Annie and I love the Blog!
Katherine
Good to hear from you, Katherine! I saw a lot of pissaladiere recipes without tomatoes, but several with them, and since we have far too many tomatoes I decided to use them. But I think I'd prefer it without tomatoes.
Cook's Illustrated is hilarious, what with its prescribed article formula: I love Food X but find that it has Several Problems, which I have eradicated through careful experimentation and a panel of "tasters" (3 colleagues who wandered down the hall at the right moment, no doubt). This post is also worth reading.
Hello to Annie, too. Come visit me.
What kills me about Cooks Illustrated is that recipes are subtitled in "Mission Impossible" style. About coq au vin: "Could we return this dish to its humble roots?"
Or pumpkin pie: "Could we reformulate this recipe and make it worthy of the holiday table?" It's enough to gag Tom Cruise himself.
Eva, I'm wondering how many recipes you read included tomatoes in them. Ofcourse traditional Pissaladiere doesn't have them. But hey, I'm a fan of 'matoes so why not? It is easy to make though isn't it and so enjoyable.
ChovyChap 2008
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