Classic Combination: French Onion Tart

This is an absolute winner. The ingredients are so cheap it's ridiculous, and takes no more technical skill than drinking a beer. It's a basic dish but easily sophisticated enough for a dinner party. The secret is in two things - firstly, make your pastry very short, and allow it to chill overnight. Secondly, when sweating down your onions, really do take the time to ensure they have softened fully, and just started to caramalise. This recipe uses Gruyere, but you could easily substitute for a mature Cheddar. Alternatively, you could use a blue cheese and add some rosemary to the onion mixture for something a little different. Serve with a warm potato salad and some salad leaves. Brilliant for lunch!

French Onion Tart
For a 12 inch tart tin

Ingredients:
300g Plain Flour
150g Cold Butter, cubed
A pinch of Salt
Ice-cold water

1kg sliced Onions
Two good pinches of grated Nutmeg
2 egg yolks
150ml Creme Fraiche
125g Gruyere, grated

Method:
1. Add flour, butter and salt to a food processor. Blitz until you reach what looks like bread-crumbs. Now add just enough cold water to bring the mixture together. It should be firm, not sticky. If it is, add more flour and repeat. Remove, wrap in cling film and leave in a fridge overnight.
2. The next day, remove the chilled pastry and line your tin. Roll the pastry to a thickness of roughly 5mm. Now transfer the pastry by wrapping it around the pin, and unroll (is that a word???) it over the tin. Tuck in the edges and trim off any excess. Return to the fridge to cool again.
3. Meanwhile, add your sliced onions to a pan with 50g butter and some olive oil. Sweat, but do not brown. You want them to reduce to an oozing, oniony, sweet, gorgeous pulp. This will take a while, be patient.
4. After 20 minutes of waiting, "blind bake" your pastry by lining it with greaseproof paper and weighting that down with some dried beans. Place in a preheated oven at 180 degrees. This is very important - you need to look for the pastry seeming "cooked" - thereby ensuring crunchy pastry later. Remove and cool.
5. By now the onions should be finished. Add nutmeg, cheese, egg yolks and creme-fraiche. Mix thoroughly, taste and correct seasoning. Add to the cooled pastry case.
6. Now put the whole thing into an oven at 180 degrees until the top is browned and the mixture has set.