Butternut Squash Tarte Tatin with Urfa Chilli, Hazelnuts & Feta
From Ainsley’s Fantastic Flavours, ITV
This is a delicious sweet-savoury twist on a tarte tatin that’s great for a veggie lunch. Turkish urfa chillies have a unique sweet and smoky flavour which work perfectly with butternut squash. If you can’t find any Urfa chilli paste you can use a combination of Aleppo pepper, cumin and sweet smoked paprika or Rose Harissa paste works well. Try to look for a butternut squash with a long neck as it makes it easier to cut plenty of round circles.
Method
Preheat the oven to 220C/200Cfan/Gas 7
Put the butternut squash slices on a baking tray and drizzle with oil. Lightly season with salt and sprinkle over half the thyme leaves and the cinnamon. Roast for 18-20 minutes or until just tender. Remove from the oven and reduce the temperature to 200c/180Cfan/Gas 6
In a 24cm heavy-based ovenproof frying pan or tatin dish, gently heat the sugar, honey and chilli paste, stirring once, over a low heat until dissolved and then turn the heat up to medium and cook for 1-2 minutes. Remove from the heat and gradually add the cubed butter, stirring or whisking to combine. Sprinkle over the finely chopped hazelnuts, thyme and sumac and then arrange the squash slices flat in the mixture, layering up if necessary to finish all the slices.
Meanwhile, roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface until it’s approx ½ cm thick. Use your pan as a guide and cut out a circle about 1cm larger than your pan.
Place the pastry on top of the pan and, using a spatula, roughly tuck in the edges between the squash and the pan, so that when the tarte is turned out it will hold in the caramel. With a sharp knife, prick the pastry a couple of times to allow any steam to escape. Bake for 30-35 minutes or until the pastry has risen and is golden brown in colour.
Leave to cool for 5 minutes and then cover with a large plate or board and carefully flip over, removing the pan. Scatter with feta, thyme and the chopped hazelnuts to serve.
Ingredients
- 1 medium butternut squash, peeled and sliced into 1.5/2cm thick round slices
- olive oil, for drizzling
- 2 tsp picked thyme leaves, plus extra for garnish
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 375g block of ready-made puff pastry
- plain flour, for dusting
- 30g golden caster sugar
- 2 tbsp honey
- 1½ tbsp urfa chilli paste
- 40g butter, chilled, cubed
- 30g hazelnuts, toasted, half roughly chopped, half finely chopped
- ½ tsp sumac
- 100g feta, crumbled
- peppery salad leaves dressed with lemon juice & olive oil, to serve