The small spinach and goat cheese tartlets with egg are ideal for Easter brunch. The combination of crispy polenta shortcrust pastry, creamy goat cheese and spinach filling and a small quail egg on top makes these tartlets the perfect spring recipe. Whether for Easter breakfast or as a starter – our simple vegetarian recipe for the mini tarts is easy to prepare.
As soon as March is here, time is racing and Easter is almost around the corner again. Even though we no longer believe in the Easter Bunny (don’t let your children read that) and no one hides eggs for us anymore (cheesy!), we still love brunch at Easter. A hearty Easter breakfast is simply part of spring! Easter brunch also offers the perfect opportunity to say goodbye to winter and its rather heavy, hearty dishes and to get a little fresher and more colorful in the kitchen. After all, March not only brings us sunnier weather, but also lots of green ingredients. The first spinach wants to be processed, the first Wild garlic leaves smell in the forest and also the first ones asparagus We have already spotted them at the weekly market.
We have combined the desire for greenery and the traditional Easter brunch in this recipe: Spinach and goat cheese tartlets with eggwhich are perfect for Easter breakfast. Baby spinach and pine nuts meet on a crispy shortcrust pastry base in a velvety goat cheese cream with egg and garlic. A small quail egg on top creates a cute Easter look. The little tartlets are easy to prepare and can also be frozen in the unlikely event that not all of them are eaten straight away. Whether as the hearty star of your Easter brunch, as a small appetizer for the holiday menu or simply to celebrate spring – these spinach and goat cheese tartlets are simply perfect for the Easter season.
What is blind baking – and why is this step important?
Anyone who has ever baked tartlets, a tart or a quiche has almost certainly stumbled across a term: Blind baking. Sounds more complicated than it is. Blind baking means that a dough base (often shortcrust pastry) is pre-baked without filling. The dough is weighted so that it doesn’t rise or bubble during baking, keeps its shape at the edges and becomes a little crispier overall. To do this, the rolled out dough is first placed in the greased mold or molds and pressed well on the base and edges. Then the dough base is pricked several times with a fork and lined with baking paper. The baking paper is then included dried legumes (Chickpeas, peas, lentils or beans work well), rice or special baking peas and pre-baked in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes. The weight keeps the floor in shape.
The key reason you shouldn’t skip this step: Without blind baking, the dough base can become soft and mushy once the wet filling is added. This is a problem, especially with a creamy egg and cheese mixture like our goat cheese filling here. The 15 minutes in the oven with weight ensure that the dough develops a stable basic structure before the filling can absorb. The result is a crispy, golden brown tartlet base.
Please do not use the dried legumes or other ingredients that you use for weighting for cooking afterwards. But you can fill them in a glass and use them again and again for blind baking.
More recipes for Easter brunch
Are you looking for more recipe ideas that fit Easter and enrich your brunch or breakfast table? Here you will find our favorite Easter recipes, from savory to sweet:
Goat cheese and spinach tartlets with egg (recipe for 7 pieces with 12 cm Ø)
Ingredients
- 250 g flour + a little more for rolling out
- 50 g polenta semolina
- 1 tbsp sugar
- Salt
- 150 g cold butter + a little more for greasing the molds
- 2 shallots
- 1 clove of garlic
- 500 g baby spinach
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 35 g pine nuts
- Nutmeg, freshly grated
- pepper
- Piment d’Espelette (or other chili flakes)
- 200 g goat’s cream cheese
- 3 eggs
- 100 ml milk
- 7 quail eggs (available in well-stocked supermarkets or weekly markets)
preparation
- Mix flour, polenta semolina, sugar and 1 teaspoon salt in a bowl. Cut the cold butter into pieces and add it. Gradually stir in 100 ml of ice-cold water until everything is just combined, but do not knead for too long. Form the dough into a ball, wrap it in cling film and place it in the fridge for 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile, peel and finely chop the shallots and garlic. Wash the spinach and spin dry. Heat the oil in a pan over medium heat, then briefly sauté the shallots and garlic. Add the pine nuts and roast briefly. Add the spinach and let it wilt. Season everything generously with a little nutmeg, salt, pepper and Piment d’Espelette and remove the pan from the heat.
- Preheat the oven to 180 °C (top/bottom heat). 7 tartlet molds (approx. 12 cm ∅ – we use ones with removable bottoms*) grease with a little butter. Take the shortcrust pastry out of the fridge and knead briefly on a lightly floured work surface and divide into 7 equal portions. Roll out each piece of dough into a round shape and slightly larger than the molds, then line the prepared molds with it and press the dough well on the bottom and sides. Cut off any excess dough. Prick the base several times with a fork. Cover the dough with baking paper, fill the molds with dried legumes or similar. Fill up for blind baking and bake the bases in the oven for 15 minutes.
- In the meantime, mix the goat’s cream cheese with the eggs and milk in a bowl until smooth. Stir in the cooled spinach mixture. Take the pre-baked tartlets out of the oven and remove the baking paper along with the legumes. Spread the spinach-goat cheese mixture evenly over the bases and use a spoon to make small depressions in the middle of the tartlets. Crack the quail eggs one at a time into a small bowl and slide 1 egg into the hollows of the tartlets. Bake the spinach tartlets on the middle shelf of the oven for about 30 minutes until golden brown. Remove the spinach and goat cheese tartlets from the oven and serve warm or cooled.
Tip: Vary the filling
If you like, you can vary the filling depending on your mood and the season. You can also use it instead of spinach Wild garlic use, crumbled Feta works as a spicy alternative to goat cheese.
Tip: Freeze tartlets and warm them up
Can the tartlets be frozen? Yes, and pretty well too. To do this, let the baked tartlets cool down and freeze them individually or stacked and separated by a piece of aluminum foil in a freezer bag. Please note that the egg yolk may lose some of its texture after thawing (but this has no effect on the taste). If you want to avoid this, freeze the tartlets without eggs and crack the fresh quail eggs onto the tartlets before baking.
How to warm up without the ground getting soggy? The microwave is your enemy here because it quickly softens the crispy polenta shortcrust pastry. Warming up in the oven works much better: warm up the tartlets in a preheated oven at 160 °C top/bottom heat for about 10-15 minutes until they are evenly warm.
*Note/advertising: For the one with an asterisk
