Russian Season

Seems like I’m moving to an apartment with an induction stove and an electric oven – that’s something new for me as I’ve always cooked with gas. Maybe that’s old-fashioned, but it’s visually clear to me, and I like that you can adjust the temperature instantly. Another big pro is that gas is considerably cheaper than electricity in my country. Maybe it’s also the bad experience from our last year’s trip to Croatia that puts me off induction stoves. We were staying in a small cottage house by the sea and the cooker in our mini-kitchen was probably the cheapest you could find. You’d have to wait for 40 minutes to bring water to a boil. Oh I still remember the evening that I tried to fry eggplants. The first three or four batches looked more like steamed eggplants - pale and spongy. Then suddenly I got a pan of overcooked eggplant chips. Then I switched off the heat, the eggplants went into trash, and we had sandwiches for dinner.

But I really hope the stove and oven in the new apartment are nothing similar to the one we had in Croatia. I can’t wait to move and unpack my new baking pans and moulds and my Villeroy&Boch cutlery. Perhaps I’ll need to buy a set of nice mugs and bowls for daily use, and a million of other things. Hope I won’t go bankrupt!

These tarts were made in our good old gas oven. We had two packs of phyllo pastry in the freezer and a lot of fresh chanterelles (they seem to be our top ingredient this summer). At first we thought of a potato and mushroom pie that we’ve already made a few times (I love pastry with potatoes!), but then we thought that the winy flavour of chanterelles would also pair perfectly with the mild sweetness of courgette. I think one can also experiment with shredded and browned carrots or fried onions here, in any combination with the mushrooms. If you have prepared the ingredients in advance, it takes you just half an hour to assemble and bake the tarts!

Ingredients

1 medium-sized courgette

1 litre chanterelles

10 sheets phyllo pastry (about 20×10cm each), thawed

A handful of finely chopped fresh parsley

1 egg, slightly beaten (optional)

Vegetable oil

Salt

Black pepper

Makes 10 tarts

Rinse and chop chanterelles. In a deep frying pan, heat some vegetable oil and cook the mushrooms, uncovered, seasoned with salt, on a medium heat, until dry and golden-brown.

Cut the courgette into thin slices (do not peel it!). In a large frying pan, heat some vegetable oil.

Season each slice with salt and cook them in batches on a medium heat until each slice is translucent and tender. Add more oil as you add new slices.

Arrange slices of cooked courgette on sheets of pastry, leaving 1-2 cm free at the edges. Season the courgettes with black pepper, top them with chanterelles and parsley. Roll the edges towards centre and seal the corners.

Brush pastry edges with beaten egg (this is optional since you will only need like ¼ of an egg for this).

Bake the tarts on a medium heat for 25 minutes.

Serve warm.