I should start by apologising to the French, in this instance I’m using the word in its English definition.
This is not so much a recipe as a recommendation. In recent months, I have turned to creating a galette of this sort when I’m confronted with vegetables I don’t know what to do with or bits of cheese that are past caring.
I’ve been known to create a heavily carrot and Cheddar version, a beetroot, potato and cheddar version, a couple of leek, potato and cheddar version (I’m sure you’ve noticed there’s a recurring ingredient here, that’s because I always have not only a current piece of cheddar in my fridge but a piece of cheddar in waiting as it were).
I make my own yogurt and cream cheese and I have in the past popped some of the cream cheese into a galette along with an egg or two to bind it all. So you see, all in all, it’s a case of putting together what you fancy.
The advantage of a galette over say a tart, is you can avoid using binding ingredients such as eggs and cream. By all means add them if you wish, but things will work happily enough without them……on the whole.
My pastry of choice is a flaky pastry, the recipe is at the bottom of this page.
I have a batch of pastry waiting in the fridge, I usually make a batch the day before, so it is nicely rested and chilled. There is nothing to stop you using shop bought pastry, pretty much of any variety, including puff pastry but why would you.
When thinking about the filling, I reach for a large bowl, gather together likely ingredients and prepare them for use. This usually entails deciding whether things need chopping into thin, or thinner pieces, whether or not I’m in a slicing or chipping mood.
Today’s galette used up, red peppers, bought in a moment of weakness in Morrison’s the other day when I saw they were on offer, Some blue cheese from the Isle of Mull, which although delicious when freshly bought, was by now a little tired, some red onions, mostly because very little gets passed me in my kitchen without onions being added and just on a complete whim, walnuts.
Prepare the filling, by slicing, dicing, or otherwise, the vegetables. The only thing you have to bear in mind is having things cook evenly. If your using cheese and why wouldn’t you, now is the time to grate some in. Notice I am not putting down precise weights here, this is where you discover you don’t really need them, you can gauge things and become an intuitive cook. Common sense is a wonderful thing and we all have it.
Mix the entire pile of ingredients together having seasoned with salt and pepper and anything else you fancy, chopped herbs, cumin or onion seeds etc, until you have what in Medieval times might have been described as a goodly amount. I would say enough to fill a 2 litre bowl, for instance. If you think there’s not enough, slice in an extra potato or two.
Roll out your pastry to a circle, roughly 30 to 35 centimetres across. I roll out on a large piece of baking parchment, so that transferring the galette to a baking tray or pan is made easy. Pile the filling in the centre and this is where it gets easy, bring up the sides of the pastry to form an overlapping edge. No gluing necessary.
Transfer to a moderate oven, 180C and bake for 45 to 50 minutes.
My Flaky Pastry.
200gm of salted butter
350gm of plain flour.
Cold water.
Begin by cutting up the butter into small pieces, add to the flour. Spend no more than a minute rubbing the butter into the flour because unlike shortcrust pastry, you want largish pieces of butter throughout the pastry, Bring together with just sufficient water to form a dough, It’s important as with all pastry, pretty much, to be careful not to add too much water so add it little by little and err on the side to caution.
Rest the dough in the fridge for half an hour or so. This quantity should be enough to make 1 large galette.
Notes:
There is nothing to stop you making smaller versions to this, in order to fit baking trays and pans that you already have.
You’ll find that the edge is good at keeping the filling in, even if you have used an egg and cream component in your filling, but the filling will cook to be much flatter than when it goes into the oven, but then I suppose so would we all
I should apologise to the French for Brexit, really, what were we thinking? I tried my best but I was in a minority.
