French Fridays with Dorie: Tourteau de Chevre
Dessert is on the menu this week for French Fridays with Dorie. The recipe is an intruiging goat cheese cake called tourteau de chevre. It wasn’t a cheesecake, in the classic New York deli way. It wasn’t a classic cake either. Even though the eggy, creamy (though creamless) goat cheese filling was poured into an unbaked pastry crust lining a springform pan, it wasn’t really a tart either. It was completely unique.
Square Cracked Pastry
The filling didn’t look promising when I fired up the mixer. At first, it was sort of thick and gloppy. Within a minute though, the filling had lightened to a smooth, pale buttery yellow, custard. (I know it’s not technical custard, but it reminded me of one.) After folding the fluffy egg whites in, the filling was quite lofty.
I have one of those glass cake dome. I’m always excited when I make something that can be stored at room temperature so I can use it. It feels like there’s a professional bakery in my kitchen, for a day at least.
I served the cake plain, but I think a berry sauce would have been a welcome topping. Maybe for the next slice.
The tourteau de chevre received mixed ratings at our house. I enjoyed it. I’d never had anything like it before. All of its characteristics worked for me, and I was pleased to find that it wasn’t too sweet or heavy. Thumbs up from me! On the other hand, my husband was underwhelmed. Even though I shared Dorie’s warning that this wasn’t going to be classic cheesecake, he was expecting a denser, richer dessert.
The other FFwD bloggers made the same cake this week. You can check out their links at French Fridays with Dorie. We don’t post the recipes, but you can find it in Dorie Greenspan’s Around My French Table.
I’m excited that I’m playing with pastry two weeks in a row. Next week’s recipe will be Spinach and Bacon Quiche!
Posted on 6 May 2011, in Baking, French Fridays with Dorie and tagged baking, French Fridays with Dorie, goat cheese. Bookmark the permalink. 23 Comments.
A Plateful of Happiness 
If you’re having trouble with your pastry like that, may I suggest this technique? You press the dough onto the base of your pan and for the sides, roll pieces of dough into cylinders, line them along the inner edge of the pan and press upwards. Voilà! You have the perfect crust when it’s cooked. It works for me every time ;-).
I am glad I am not the only person that gets excited to pull out their cake dome!
Dorie’s sweet tart dough is very forgiving – I have found myself swapping it out for tart dough on other recipes.
Your tourteau looks fabulous! And I’m jealous you got your crust rolled out that well. I ended up hand pressing mine in the pan because it just wouldn’t stick together.
I was thinking of a berry sauce too. Your cake looks like it rose perfectly!
Your Tourteau looks gorgeous! Love your photos! Very nice job. I had to add a bit of ice water to my tart dough to make it pliable enough to roll! All and all a great recipe that I will definitely make again! Happy Mother’s Day!
how wonderful !!! I loved it and I’m glad in some ways it was appreciated at your place
I’m excited about next week too! We all get a second chance with the tart dough!
I love that your cake has so much height. Very pretty. Good idea about the berry sauce.
My dough crumbled when I tried to roll it too. I used a square pan though, so I was still able to press the dough into it. If I make this cake again, I may make a traditional sugar cookie dough and see how that works.
Beautiful photos!! Yours is so tall and elegant. I had trouble with the dough, too…but, in the end, it looked fine :)
Your tourteau is lovely ! We also had issues with the pastry dough that Nana (thankfully) had made ahead of time and brought over to my house. We struggled a bit getting it into shape but ended up just patching it and going for a “rustic” look. We had fun and it tasted lovely. It is interesting to try a food that is so difficult to describe. Anyone expecting classic cheesecake would be disappointed but we had fun trying this regardless. Great post.
Here here to forgiving doughs. Yours looks fantastic!
Very nice looking tourteau. I took liked the idea that this tort could sit outside the fridge on my table for everyone to nibble…and it went fast. And I liked the idea that the kids could just slice a piece and eat it with their hands…no mess and no dirty dishes. Lots of good things about this tort…Enjoyed your post.
Beautiful photo of your cheesecake, nice puff! Your cake had about the same amount of color as mine, I think it’s beautiful. I was afraid it might be dry and overdone if I left it in the oven longer to try to get the top a darker brown or brown all over. I added more water to the dough and Rolled it out between two sheets of Saran wrap, that worked fine with no cracks. I took off the top sheet of wrap flipped it in the pan and then pulled off the other sheet of wrap and trimmed the edges in the pan. Hope that helps;-)
Your tourteau looks so tall and elegant!
Your cake looks gorgeous!! I love the height of it.
Your tourteau is beautiful! I love when I can use one of my cake domes too!
Your torteau looks lovely – very different to what I have ever tried before too.
wow, your torte looks wonderful! Nice and high! Rolling out crust can be so hard sometimes, I can appreciate your difficulties with it. Thanks for reading my post. I am already having so much fun. I had a domed cake plate too, but gave it away a few years back. Now I wish I had it again. I’ll look for one at a yard sale maybe.
Wow! Great looking torte!
It’s pretty much perfect!
Your cake looks beautiful. I would have never guessed you had problems with the crust.
Your photos are beautiful. I am sorry I was not able to make this last week, but will have to make it at a later date. It looks so dense and delicious. I wonder if my husband will have the same reaction as yours because cheesecake is a favorite dessert of his. It is so pretty and perfect to show off under a beautiful cake dome!
omg
im so happy to see aother one that had a bit of craggly tart dough that eaked over the cheesecake and a top that didnt really sink either!! :) But regardless of appearance, I’m with you, it tastes great!!
I just finished this today :)
http://acookingmizer.wordpress.com/2011/11/17/tourteau-de-chevre/