Cornmeal- Sweet and Savory: Blueberry Tart with Cornmeal Crust and Fried Green Tomatoes

Make a blueberry tart as an open faced fruit tart with homemade cornmeal crust. Try these fried or baked  slices of green tomatoes with a cornmeal and rice or regular flour, for a side dish. Great in a sandwich with turkey or vegetarian with cucumbers, sprouts and tahini paste

Cornmeal was the early settler’s “flour’ since growing wheat was not yet common in Puritan times. The American Indian showed the new inhabitants how to cook with cornmeal.  We have recipes to this day that are gluten free  (unless flour is added and then we would substitute rice flour), high in fiber and with a Glycemic Index of 58 on a scale of 1-100. (100 being the highest on the scale for raising blood sugars.)  Yellow cornmeal has more carotenoids than white and stone ground is preferred to enriched degerminated cornmeal, but either product works well with any recipe.

Featured Products: 

Stoneground Cornmeal, King Arthur All Purpose flour  and Betty Crocker Gluten Free Rice Flour

Fried Green Tomatoes

• 1 cup of stoneground yellow or white cornmeal
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup regular all purpose flour or rice flour
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper
• 2 sprigs of fresh thyme leaves
• 4 green tomatoes sliced in 1/2 inch slices
• 1 teaspoon of hot sauce
• olive oil

Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl, in a second bowl, beat the egg and salt and pepper and hot sauce.   Dip the sliced tomatoes into the egg mixture and then flour and cornmeal mix,  and place in a preheated skillet with 2 tablespoons of  olive oil.   Sauté for 3 minutes on each side until golden brown and drain on a paper towel.

Blueberry Crostata with Cornmeal Crust

• 1/2 cup of cornmeal
• 1 cup of all purpose flour
• 3/4 cup of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 6 tablespoons of butter
• 3 tablespoons of ice water
• 1 egg
• 2 -3 cups of blueberries
• pinch of mace or nutmeg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place all ingredients except ice water, blueberries, mace  and 1/2 cup of sugar into a food processor and pulse 3 x until mixture resembles small peas. Add the ice water 1 tablespoon at a time until it becomes a ball. Empty contents onto wax paper and press into a disk. Let rest in the refrigerator for 3-6 hours.  Mix blusberries, sugar and a pinch of mace or nutmeg together. Take the dough out of the refrigerator and roll further to a 12″ disk. Place on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet.  Spoon blueberry mixture in the center of the dough a overlap the dough all round the tart with a 2 inch border and bake until crust is golden and blueberries are jam like for 1 hour. You can also use a premade dough and place on a cookie sheet tray and continue with recipe.