Baking by Hand: Oyster Mushroom, Thyme and Chevre Tart

This post is part of a blog tour promoting the new book, Baking by Hand, by Andy and Jackie King. The publisher provided me with a copy of the book. Baking by Hand makes my list of the 5 best baking cookbooks. If you’re interested, do check out the rest as well. My history of cookbook purchases describes a Bell curve. I started out small, progressed to buying a car payment’s worth every month and then tapered off when I decided that I didn’t really need any more. These days, I rarely purchase cookbooks. I think I’ve bought two this entire year. While I was given this book to read and share, I must admit that I wasn’t jumping up and down over the idea. Until I started to read. I couldn’t stop reading. I sort of felt like I was in a church listening to a sermon from a particularly passionate preacher. And he was preaching to me, the choir. I kept nodding and wanting to shout an “Amen!” or a “Preach, friends!” on more than one occasion. When passionate people write about their passion, it shines through. And man does this book shine. Let me share a few of the more Amen-able quotes.

One of the reasons we love artisan bread is that, while is should be amazing on its own, it’s also a perfect starting-off point for greater things. I’m not just talking about food–I’m talking about gathering those you care about near to you, facing one another and sharing a meal. –Baking by Hand, p. 9 Our goal is to create a literal consumable; we want you to tear our product apart, not present it an a gallery. –p. 11 We put things on bread because it’s the perfect canvas to feature well-prepared ingredients. It’s the unsung hero of the sandwich world, which is ironic because it’s what makes those slices of cheese and meat a sandwich to begin with. Yet so many delis out there pay so much attention to the stuffing and skimp on the bread. –p. 127 Each tart is treated differently depending on the components. This is what keeps us on our toes when testing day rolls around; we are not only putting flavor combinations together, but what we create also has to work in terms of texture and function. –p. 183 The pastry dough is a great template for both sweet and savory foods, so feel free to use the recipes as a jumping-off point for your own ingredient combinations in the future.

Can I get an Amen? When I agreed to write a post for this blog tour, I chose the recipe I would present from a short list before I’d even seen the book. While all the recipe titles sounded tasty like they’d be tasty, I decided that I would go with a savory recipe rather than a sweet one. Pastry chefs deal with pastry, whether it be savory or sweet, and I rarely flex my savory pastry muscles anymore.

I am so glad I did, too. The (Oyster) Mushroom, Thyme and Chèvre Tart was absolutely delicious and thoughtfully  composed. From the blitz puff pastry whose layers shattered like warm amber glass once baked, to the duxelles which was confident enough to rely on the alchemy of shallot, mushroom and heat alone, to the assembly: concentric rings of dark duxelles, creamy-white goat cheese shading to sienna from the heat of the the oven, and frilly mushroom caps, the entire tart was a masterpiece of simple genius. That might sound like hyperbole, but I assure you I speak the truth. This is one fine tart.

When you treat each component with care and let them shine by seasoning them simply, magic can happen. It’s the master who can make a short ingredient list sing. I cannot wait to try out some of Alan and Jackie’s other recipes, because they are masters. I could go on about the way these two have learned to manipulate the temperature of their components in order to achieve their desired results, but I will save that for a full-on review after I’ve baked through more of the book. For now, let me just say that I am happy to announce the arrival of a baking book that you need, from which you will learn, and to which you will turn again and again.

I asked to share the blitz puff recipe as well as the tart recipe since the dough was a dream to work with, so here are recipes for both the dough and the tart.

A couple of notes about how my version of the Oyster Mushroom, Thyme and Chèvre Tart differs from the original:

• I could not find oyster mushrooms, so I substituted half shiitake and half crimini mushrooms.
• I chose to make a full-sized tart. The original recipe makes six individual tarts.
• I gave my blitz puff pastry four turns rather than the two called for in the instructions. The dough was very crumbly after only two turns. The extra two whipped it into better shape for me, and it worked beautifully. If your dough comes together with only two turns, by all means go with it. I am tempted to make it with a full six turns next time. With as butter-rich as it is, and with as beautifully as it rose with just four turns, I imagine it will be behave almost identically to classic puff pastry after six turns.
• Because of the extra turns, I docked (poked a bunch of tiny holes with the tip of a knife) the bottom of the tart within an inch of its life. Even so, I still had to poke it several times with a skewer during baking.

I am very much looking forward to baking more treats from this book. As well, I will update this post with the other stops on the tour. Currently, one other post is up from Colleen at Soufflé Bombay: Spiced Pumpkin Bread Pudding with Maple Glaze. UPDATE: Karen from Karen’s Kitchen Stories posted The Massachusetts Un-Roast Beef Sandwich and Baguette Recipe. Nice! Thanks so much for stopping in and reading. Have a wonderful day!