I have a lot of Instagram crushes, but these days one man definitely takes the lead…
That man is Julius Roberts, the former London-based chef who fled the restaurant rat race to raise pigs, chickens, goats, and sheep on an impossibly picturesque farm in the English countryside near the Dorset coast. His life is enviable, of course, but it’s his style of cooking and recipes that got me in the first place. He’s always pulling some veg-forward, rustic looking showstopper from the rusty old oven in his outdoor shed, and I’m pretty sure I forward 99% percent of these posts to my husband with the message “we are making this,” if he hasn’t already done the same to me.
This past spring, for instance, Roberts demo’d a beautiful asparagus tart with ricotta and spring herbs (it’s also in his excellent book, The Farm Table). Then, in the summer, he made basically the same thing, but with zucchini and basil. So, last week, I came up with what I know would be a Julius-Roberts-approved fall interpretation: Honeynut Squash with Herby Ricotta. And I was reminded that yet again that the best cookbook authors don’t just teach specific recipes — they teach technique and confidence.
Here’s the recipe, but as Roberts would say, “frankly, you can make it with your eyes closed.”
Squash Tart with Herby Ricotta
I served it with a gem lettuce salad tossed with toasted buckwheat, scallions, a sprinkling of nutritional yeast (instead of Parm, which felt like cheese overload with the tart), and a basic vinaigrette, but my go-to Green Salad would be just fine, too.
Herby Ricotta
1 cup ricotta
3 ounces feta, crumbled (plus more for garnish)
1/3 cup dill (plus more for garnish)
1/3 cup chives or parsley (plus more for garnish)
zest from 1/2 lemon
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
For Tart
1 sheet puff pastry (such as Dufour Brand), fully thawed
Herby Ricotta (above)
12-14 ounces butternut or honeynut squash, sliced thin on a mandoline
1 tablespoon olive oil
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
red pepper flakes
1 egg, whisked
Preheat the oven to 425°F. Make the herby ricotta: Add the ricotta, feta, herbs, lemon zest, salt, and pepper to a food processor and whirl until creamy and blended. (If you don’t want to break out a major piece of machinery, just finely chop the herbs and vigorously whisk everything together in a mixing bowl.)
Roll out puff pastry on a floured surface, then transfer to a parchment-paper lined baking sheet. Using a knife, sketch a rectangle in the middle of the dough, leaving a 1-inch perimeter around it. (This will help make your puff pastry rise appealingly on the edges.) Using a rubber spatula, evenly spread the ricotta cream inside the rectangle, then top with squash slices, a little overlap is fine.
Brush the perimeter of the dough with the egg wash. Bake for 20-25 minutes until dough is puffy and golden and the squash is cooked through. Sprinkle with a little more crumbled feta, some red pepper flakes, and more chopped fresh herbs, which I forgot to do for the photo.
P.S. Twenty-minute coconut chicken soup and eight things to do with almost-rotten produce.