Upside-Down Tomato Tart

I like the drama of an upside-down tart. The most famous example is a tarte Tatin, which consists of apples that are cooked in a caramel in a skillet; topped with pastry; baked; and inverted so that the pastry base wears the gleaming, deeply bronzed apple crown. It’s a treat that can’t help but impress. The framework has been adapted to seasonal fruits such as peaches, plums, and pears. So why not tomatoes? The bright, savory-sweet fruit would pair naturally with buttery pastry, and by adding components such as herbs and aromatics to a less-sweet stand-in for the caramel, I could easily shift my iteration from the traditional dessert squarely into savory territory.

The Building Blocks

Plenty of upside-down tarts use store-bought puff pastry, and I saw no reason not to do the same. Packaged puff bakes up decidedly crisp and is frankly quite good; plus, it’s a much easier alternative to preparing pie or