Sweet winter squash, meltingly tender onions, and vibrant herbs come together for this savory pumpkin galette recipe. It's a lovely fall vegetable recipe that pairs well with an autumn salad of bitter greens and a tart vinaigrette.
Jump to Recipe | What is it? | What's in it? | Tips | Variations
What is it?
A galette is a free-form pie in the tradition of French country baking. Unlike pies, which bake in a deep dish, galettes are baked flat on a sheet pan or baking stone. They can be either savory or sweet, and this version is a savory pumpkin galette touched with herbs and creamy goat cheese.
What's in it?
Like a pie, there are two parts to a galette: its crust and its filling. For this galette, we start with a tender crust blended with all-purpose flour and whole-wheat pastry flour. Its filling includes pumpkin purée, melted onions, sage, thyme, parmesan cheese, and chèvre, which gives the galette a resonantly savory flavor.
- Whole wheat pastry flour is stone-ground from soft white wheat berries, which has a lower protein content than flour used for bread. This means it makes a tender galette crust with a big, whole-grain flavor.
- Fresh Pumpkin makes the bulk of the filling for the galette. You purchase a canned pumpkin, but roasting fresh pumpkin gives a deeper flavor. Pumpkin is also rich in beta-carotene, a potent antioxidant.
- Onions, garlic, and herbs give the galette a pleasant sweet-savory flavor that complements pumpkin - especially when you cook the onions until meltingly tender.
- Parmesan and chèvre give the galette filling a little bulk, and their salty edge brings balance to the sweetness of pumpkin and onions.
Tips
Galettes are decidedly more rustic and a little easier to put together than a pie, but there's a three-step process that you'll follow to make one. This pumpkin galette begins by making the pastry, then the filling, and then assembling them together. Here are a few tips to help the process go smoothly.
- You can make the pastry dough in advance and store it in the fridge for up to five days. Let it rest at room temperature for about an hour before rolling it out.
- You can roast the pumpkin in advance. It'll keep in the fridge in an airtight container for up to three days.
- Cook the onions until completely soft, they'll soften and melt into one another. This slow, gentle cooking gives them a mellow sweetness and makes them easier to purée.
- You can use a food processor for both the pastry dough and the filling if you prefer. Just make sure the food processor is fully clean before making the filling.
- Let it cool to room temperature before slicing. That will give the filling a chance to stiffen up a bit, making slicing easier.
Variations
Make it gluten-free. You can use all-purpose gluten-free flour in this crust. Keep in mind that you may need to adjust the amounts of butter and water.
Add lard to the crust. You can substitute cold lard for the butter in this pie crust. Make sure it's from pasture-raised hogs and contains no additives.
Add bacon to the filling. Crumbled bacon gives the filling a pleasant note of salt and smoke.
Skip the chèvre, and substitute additional parmesan cheese instead.
Use other winter squash instead of pumpkin. You can also use acorn, butternut, honeynut, and other hard winter squash in to make the filling.
Make it sweet. While sage, thyme, and onions make delicious savory pumpkin galettes, if you like a sweet version, try using this pumpkin custard as a filling instead of the filling above.
Ann says
Delicious. Baked on a stone with out parchment paper.