Pissaladière is the perfect dinner to enjoy on a cold winter night while curled up by the fireplace. This Provencal rectangle onion tart dish is most popular in southern France including towns like Nice, Marseilles, and the Var district. This pizza-like bread dough is thicker than most and the toppings don’t include your typical cheese and tomatoes, but rather onions, olives, garlic and anchovies.

Remember to pay close attention to the onions when making this dish. A burned onion can give the whole recipe a bitter flavor.

Prep Time: 10 Minutes

Cook Time: 1 Hour

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 6 yellow onions, chopped
• 2 teaspoons demerara sugar (raw sugar)
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon black pepper
• ½ teaspoon dried thyme
• 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
• 1 sheet puff pastry, thawed
• 20 anchovy fillets
• 20 black olives in oil, drained
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme

Preparation:

As reported on http://frenchfood.about.com/od/appetizershorsdoeuvres/r/pissaladiere.htm

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onions and demerara sugar and sauté, stirring frequently, until the onions become tender and start to turn golden. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and thyme. Stir the mixture and transfer the skillet to the preheated oven. Cook for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onions are wilted, very soft, and are a medium gold throughout.

Add the vinegar during the last 5 minutes of cooking. Remove from the onions from the oven and set them aside while preparing the pastry for the pissaladiere until they reach room temperature, and then serve.

Raise the oven temperature to 425F. Press the thawed pastry into a rectangle on a 12-inch by 18-inch baking sheet, building it up a bit around the edges. Spread the pastry with the onion confit, leaving 1 inch of dough uncovered around the edges of the pastry. Arrange the anchovy filets and olives on the pissaladière. Bake it for 15 to 25 minutes, until the pastry has puffed up, turned golden, and crisped.

Remove the pissaladière from the oven and sprinkle the olive oil and fresh thyme across the hot surface of the tart. Cut it into rectangles and serve very warm or at room temperature.

Makes 10 servings

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