The Art of Making Perfect Caramelized Onion Tart

As you watch, can you see that the bubbles are bigger and almost slower? They’re more viscous because as the water is evaporating from the sugar syrup, it is getting thicker. Don’t try to do this in a really dark pan. It’s just harder to see the color of the caramel. So this is just a warning.

See how it’s browning around the edges and not in the center? That is why we want to swirl it. I can smell that it’s turning into caramel. Look at that color. O.K., so we have caramel right now. This is a very light caramel. The lighter your caramel, the sweeter it is. The darker your caramel, the less sweet it is. As the sugar caramelizes, it loses its sweetness, it gets more of a toasty taste. So this is the color I want.

I’m turning off the heat. What color is that? Is it the color of an Irish setter? “Do I love to say that? Yes, I do. And when it gets to be perfect color, it’s off the heat. It’s cooking in the residual little heat of the pan and stop the cooking with a little bit of vinegar. It cools it down immediately and it also tames the sweetness. Look at that. Kalamata olives. You could use any kind of olives. You want to pit them because you’re nice.

And then now I’m going to add my beautiful tomatoes.” “Look at that. So your hand’s your best bet for the onions. If you just want to scatter them and make sure you get a nice, even distribution of onions. I’m just going to move this. The burner is very hot. You want to just cover all the tomatoes with onions like that.

Just a little bit of salt, maybe a little more salt, some pepper, and thyme leaves. These are really nice. It just gives it a lovely, fresh flavor. You know what else would be good on this? Anchovies. Chopped up anchovies mixed into that onion. Oh my god. That would be amazing.

O.K., I’m going to get the pastry to put on top of this. I love a giant fridge. I do not have one at home. So all I’m going to do is just lay this right on top, and I’m going to tuck it in around the edges. And again, don’t forget, no one is going to see this part, so you don’t have to worry too much.

And now I’m going to score the top of this, and that’s just to let the steam out while this is baking. Yeah. My oven has been preheated to 425. So you always want to do that before you start because this thing comes together pretty quickly.

The moment of truth. Is it going to come out of the pan? Now, I know this is the scariest part. It looks more intimidating than it is. As long as you don’t let this get completely cool, it’s not going to glue itself onto the bottom of the pan. And then before you even do anything, take a little knife or an offset spatula and go around the sides just to make sure to loosen the pastry.

You can see it kind of moving. This is a good sign because if it moves, it is obviously not stuck. Bravery. Take your plate. Put it upside down. Who doesn’t love the big blue oven mitts? All right. So hold it from both sides like that.

I’m going to get a smaller plate because it’s just easier to hold. Makes everybody less nervous. Yeah, see, this is easy. Then you can just hold it like this. And a 1, and a 2, and a 3. Wee! “Voila. Oh my god, it’s perfect.

This is definitely best warm, but it’s also good at room temperature. So if you want to make it earlier in the day, unmold it while it’s warm and serve it a couple of hours later. It holds up really well. It also reheats well.” “Get all the little bits. Deliciously messy. I’m so excited to eat this.”

“It’s so good. I mean, the tomatoes are amazing. But to me, the best part is the combination of the sweet, sweet caramelized onions and the olives. Like, that salty with the sweet, and then you just have the juiciness of the tomatoes, and of course, the buttery crust. It’s so good, you guys. You got to make this. Please make this. Find the recipe at nytcooking.com, and then leave a comment and let us know how it came out because we want to hear from you.

And that is all. I’m going to finish this slice right now. Bye.”

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en“I hate peeling peaches,tomatoes, fava beans.Bananas are O.K. Once I workedwith a chef who had me peel --wait for it -- peas.He said people who don’t peelpeas are not nice people.I’m like, I’m nice.I just don’t peel peas.”“Hi, I’m Melissa Clark.I’m a food columnist andreporter for the ‘New YorkTimes’ and ‘NYT Cooking.’ AndI’m here in the beautiful NYTcooking studio kitchen to makea caramelized tomato tartetatin because it’s summerand the tomatoes are gorgeousand it is justa lovely pastry.Tarte tatin is a traditionalFrench pastry, usually madewith apples.You make a caramel onthe bottom of a skillet,you put your apples, then youput some puff pastry on topand you bake it.And then you turn it over, andyou have this gorgeous appletart that’s reallyeasy to make.So what I did inthis recipe wassubstitute cute little cherrytomatoes for the apples.I still use acaramel and I alsoadd Kalamata olives, whichmake it just briny and salty.And I also add caramelizedonions, which have,like, a sweet, savory flavor.It is beautiful.It is so summery.It’s exactly the thing todo when you want, like,a showstopping --I mean, I would eatit as a dinner entree.I mean, it’s verysubstantial --or as an appetizer or justbecause you want to eatsomething gorgeous.”“I have some all butterpuff pastry here.If you can find the stuffmade with all butter,it is really much betterthan the non butter.However, either one will work.If you want to just use aregular pie crust for this,that works too.It doesn’t get puffy, but itgets golden brown and flaky,and it’s really good.And I have done that witha homemade pie dough.If you ever have homemadepie dough hanging outin your freezer, this isa great place to use it.So I want to cut it into acap that’s going to fit on topof the pan just on the inside.All skillets are alittle bit different.So even if this is a 9 inchskillet or maybe it’s a 10inch skillet, dependingon where you measure it,it’s very frustrating thatthey are not standard.The way to get this to workbest is just to measure itand then you canmeasure the pastry.Yeah, see, this is 10 and ahalf inches And on the bottom,this is 7 inches.What size skillet is it?Somewhere between 7 --I would call this a 9 inch.Maybe it’s a 10 inch.Anyway, use whateverskillet you have.Just measure it.We know this is 10and a half inches,so I’m going tomake this 10 inches.I’m going to cutthis from the middle.I’m marking it.Here’s another thing.You don’t have to worryabout being exact.If it’s a little bit toobig, you just tuck it under.And if it’s a littlebit too small,it’s not going to matterbecause when you flip it over,no one is going to see it.And then cut it intoan approximate circle.”“Never throw out your scraps.I’m going to put thisback in the freezer.I’m not going touse it right now.But if I wanted to, I wouldprobably make cheese strawsout of this.I’m just going to put thiswhole thing in the fridgeright now.You want to keep it coldbecause if it gets too warm,it will stick to this cuttingboard and then you will neverget it off and you’ll be sad.”“In this bowl I have threelarge red onions that havebeen sliced.We have done this ahead, soyou don’t have to watch me crywhen I do it in front of you.Red onions are greatbecause they’re very sweet.You could also useregular onions,white onions, Spanish onions.It doesn’t matter.Once you caramelize them,you’re not going to tastea huge difference.But I do think that the redones are slightly sweeter.A little bit of butter.Let’s do a littleviewers poll.Is this a lot of butteror a little butter?To me, this is just alittle bit of butter.But maybe people out therethink it’s a lot of butter.You think it’sa lot of butter?Mom thinks it’sa lot of butter.I mean, we all love butter.And whenever you cookanything in melted butter,you want to wait forthe foam to subside.Because then youknow the butteris going to be hot enough.So see all that white foam?We’re going to heat thebutter until the foam startsto dissipate.There you go.And look, it’s starting toget a little bit golden.We’re getting like aslight brown butter action.That’s great.Extra flavor.”“O.K. I’m going to lowerthe heat to medium.I’m adding justa pinch of sugar,and this is justto help the color.It’s going to make ita little bit browner.This is going to take 15 to20 minutes for the onionsto really cook down.If you can see, I’m actuallyalready starting to get somenice color on these.And now would be a good time,if you haven’t, I don’t know,rinsed your tomatoesor call your mom --do something nice for youin the next 15 minutes.Pay attention.If you start to smellsomething that smells toobrown, you know it’s timeto turn down the heat.Don’t stand here like this.This is bad.O.K., I’m going away.So you see howthat is startingto brown at theedges of the pan,probably because Iturned it up too high?You add just a littlebit of water to the pan,it deglazes it and ithelps the onions cook.”:“O.K. This is whatwe are looking for.Look at how beautiful that is.The onions are verysoft and floppy.They haven’t cookeddown to a jam.They’re still onions, but theyjust have this beautiful browncolor and a nice,silky texture.All that brown stuff on thebottom of the pan is nowabsorbed into the onions, andthat’s where the flavor is.So that’s great.”“And these can just hang outwhile we make the caramel.But before I do that, Iam going to wash this outbecause I want to start witha clean pan for the caramel.Look how pretty all this is.Some seriouslypretty mise en place.You don’t have touse a mix of colors.You can use all one colortomato, whatever you have.But I mean, this isvery, very charismatic.And also, I need to pointout this little dude.Look how cute.Little itty bitty tomato.Like a little jelly bean.Let’s make caramel.Heat is going to be on medium.I like to use the wet method.So I’m combining sugarand water in the skilletat the same time.If I just usesugar in this panand let it meltand caramelize,it would be alittle bit faster.But it would also be a littlebit riskier because you couldget little sugar crystals.It’s harder to control it.It goes faster.What I’m doing is meltingall the sugar crystalsin the water, and then I’mevaporating off the water.So it takes alittle more time.It’s like an insurance policyif you are nervous aboutcaramel, which I guess I am alittle nervous about carameleven though I madecaramel all the time.I just like the wet method.You see how the sugaris turning to syrup?That’s a sugar.And then as Iswirl it, it melts.I find this very satisfying.One little corner overhere doesn’t want to melt.So now that it’s all melted,I’m just going to let it hangout and I’m going to swirlthe pan every once in a while.Swirling the pan helps mixthe sugar syrup so that itcaramelizes evenly andyou don’t get dark spots.Should you start to seeany kind of crystallizationor burning, youcan immediatelypick it up and just go,choop, choop, choop.This is cool.As you’re watching it, canyou see that the bubbles arebigger and almost slower?They’re more viscous becauseas the water is evaporatingfrom the sugar syrup,it is getting thicker.Don’t try to do thisin a really dark pan.It’s just harder to seethe color of the caramel.So this is just a warning.See how it’s browningaround the edges and notin the center?That is why wewant to swirl it.I can smell that it’sturning into caramel.Look at that color.O.K., so we havecaramel right now.This is a very light caramel.The lighter your caramel,the sweeter it is.The darker your caramel,the less sweet it is.As the sugar caramelizes,it loses its sweetness,it gets more ofa toasty taste.So this is the color I want.I’m turning off the heat.What color is that?Is it the color ofan Irish setter?”“Do I love to say that?Yes, I do.And when it gets to be perfectcolor, it’s off the heat.It’s cooking in the residuallittle heat of the panand stop the cooking witha little bit of vinegar.It cools it downimmediately and it alsotames the sweetness.Look at that.Kalamata olives.You could use anykind of olives.You want to pit thembecause you’re nice.And then now I’m going toadd my beautiful tomatoes.”“Look at that.So your hand’s yourbest bet for the onions.If you just want toscatter them and make sureyou get a nice, evendistribution of onions.I’m just going to move this.The burner is very hot.You want to justcover all the tomatoeswith onions like that.Just a little bit ofsalt, maybe a little moresalt, some pepper,and thyme leaves.These are really nice.It just gives it alovely, fresh flavor.You know what elsewould be good on this?Anchovies.Chopped up anchoviesmixed into that onion.Oh my god.That would be amazing.O.K., I’m going to get thepastry to put on top of this.I love a giant fridge.I do not have one at home.So all I’m going to do isjust lay this right on top,and I’m going to tuckit in around the edges.And again, don’t forget, noone is going to see this part,so you don’t haveto worry too much.And now I’m going toscore the top of this,and that’s just to let thesteam out while this isbaking.Yeah.My oven has beenpreheated to 425.So you always wantto do that before youstart because this thingcomes together pretty quickly.And I’m going topop it in the oven.”“Oh, beautiful.”“The moment of truth.Is it going to comeout of the pan?Now, I know this isthe scariest part.It looks moreintimidating than it is.As long as you don’t letthis get completely cool,it’s not going to glue itselfonto the bottom of the pan.And then before youeven do anything,take a little knifeor an offset spatulaand go around thesides just to makesure to loosen the pastry.You can see it kind of moving.This is a good signbecause if it moves,it is obviously not stuck.Bravery.Take your plate.Put it upside down.Who doesn’t love thebig blue oven mitts?All right.So hold it from bothsides like that.”“I’m going to get a smallerplate because it’s just easierto hold.Makes everybody less nervous.Yeah, see, this is easy.Then you can justhold it like this.And a 1, and a 2, and a 3.Wee!”“Voila.Oh my god, it’s perfect.”“This is definitely best warm,but it’s also good at roomtemperature.So if you want to makeit earlier in the day,unmold it while it’s warm andserve it a couple of hourslater.It holds up really well.It also reheats well.”“Get all the little bits.Deliciously messy.I’m so excited to eat this.”“It’s so good.I mean, the tomatoesare amazing.But to me, the bestpart is the combinationof the sweet, sweet,caramelized onionsand the olives.Like, that saltywith the sweet,and then you just have thejuiciness of the tomatoes,and, of course,the buttery crust.It’s so good, you guys.You got to make this.Please make this.Find the recipeat nytcooking.com,and then leave acomment and letus know how itcame out because wewant to hear from you.And that is all.I’m going to finishthis slice right now.Bye.”\n"