Kimchi Tarte Flambée with Lardo and Perilla Leaf
Alsace's thin, blistered flatbread of cream, onion and bacon rebuilt with Korean fire: a base of fromage blanc and gochujang, a scatter of aged kimchi, translucent lardo that melts into it, and perilla leaves torn over at the end. Fifteen minutes from oven to table.
- For the dough: 250 g plain flour, 2 tablespoons oil, 130 ml water, pinch of salt
- 150 g fromage blanc or thick yogurt
- 3 tablespoons crème fraîche
- 1 tablespoon gochujang
- 200 g well-aged kimchi, squeezed dry and chopped
- 80 g lardo, sliced paper thin
- A handful of perilla (or shiso) leaves
- Toasted sesame oil
- Mix the dough ingredients, knead briefly, rest 20 minutes. Heat the oven to its maximum with a stone or steel inside for 45 minutes.
- Mix the fromage blanc, crème fraîche and gochujang. Season lightly.
- Roll half the dough into a rough oval 2 mm thick on floured paper. Spread thinly with the cream, scatter with kimchi, lay the lardo over.
- Slide onto the stone and bake 4 to 5 minutes until the edges char and the lardo turns translucent.
- Tear the perilla over, add a few drops of sesame oil, cut into strips. Repeat with the second tart.
Tarte flambée, or flammekueche, is the Alsatian bread that bakers once used to test the heat of a wood oven: a sheet of dough rolled thin as paper, smeared with cream and fromage blanc, scattered with onion and bacon, and baked for three minutes until the edges char. It is a dish about the oven more than the toppings. Korean kimchi, cabbage fermented with chilli, garlic and fish sauce, is a condiment about time more than heat. Our kitchen found that a very hot oven does to kimchi what a griddle does: caramelises its sugars and softens its acid into something almost sweet.
The base stays Alsatian: fromage blanc loosened with cream, but seasoned with a spoon of gochujang, the Korean fermented chilli paste, so it glows faintly orange. On top goes well-aged kimchi, squeezed of its brine and chopped, and in place of bacon, paper-thin slices of Italian lardo, cured pork fat that melts in the oven's heat into a translucent glaze. Out of the oven, the tart is finished with torn perilla leaves, the Korean herb with a flavour between mint, basil and cumin, and a few drops of toasted sesame oil.
On the oven
The dough must be rolled to 2 millimetres, no thicker, and the oven as hot as it goes with a stone or steel preheated for an hour. Four minutes is usually enough; the edges should be black in places. A wood oven does it in ninety seconds. Squeeze the kimchi hard; wet kimchi makes a soggy centre.
Cut into strips and eat with the fingers, standing, with a cold Alsatian Riesling or a Korean rice beer. It disappears faster than anything else we make.