When I hear numbers like over 30% of our food ends up in the garbage I am concerned about what that says. What are our levels of respect for the food products we use and the energy it takes to grow, harvest, transport, process and deliver nutrition to our tables. ” In my kitchen filled with Care, I welcome, Earth, Fire, Water, Air” takes on another meaning when referencing composting, plastics, recycling and garbage.
Today, I came across a recipe that used pastry. The solution for the person who had written the recipe was to simply throw away the left over bits. This recipe is really about thinking differently. When I have left over pastry, I turn them into tart shells and freeze them unbaked for future projects, creating less waste, saving me time and energy and respecting the plants that gave up there life force so I could live.
The FIFA Women’s World Championships were this afternoon and I thought a treat would be nice for the people in my home watching. I pulled the tarts shells from the freezer and put together a blueberry/cinnamon cheese filling.
You will need:
Tray of 8 pre-done tarts shells
3/4 cup blueberries
2 tsp. flour
2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. zest orange
1 tsp. lemon juice
3 Tbsp. cream cheese
1/8 tsp. cinnamon
1 Tbsp. brown sugar
Close your eyes, open your heart and lungs to inspiration. ” In my kitchen filled with Care, I welcome, Earth, Fire, Water Air. ”
Heat the oven to 400 degrees and once hot, pop the frozen tart shells in the oven for 10 minutes. Make sure you have poked the shells with a fork so that they do not bubble and rise before the filled shells go back into the oven.
Mix the blueberries, sugar, flour, orange zest and lemon juice together. Feel free to substitute lemon zest if you have that handy.
I often zest my citrus fruit in advance of juicing it and keep a supply on hand that I can then pull from. The full post on how to do that is here.
Put the blueberries aside and mix the ingredients for the cream cheese portion. If you don’t have cream cheese handy but you 
do have more blueberries, then simply up the ingredients to the right proportions for 1 cup blueberries and leave out the cream cheese section.
Mix the cream cheese, brown sugar and cinnamon together.
Take the shells out of the oven and turn the oven down to 350 degrees. Equally divide the cream cheese mixture into the tarts shells and then top with the blueberries.
Return the tarts to the oven and bake for another 25 minutes or until the pastry is brown and the blueberries are bubbling.
Remove tarts from the oven and the tins. Leaving the tarts in the tins can mean they will stick to the forms themselves when the sugary part of the filling cools and thickens. Allow to cool on a wire rack. Top with a dollop Honeyed Greek yoghurt or whipped cream.
There are many variations on this theme, mostly based on what is in your kitchen at any given moment. My wish is that this post underscores the idea that with a little forethought there is no need to contribute to that 30% plus of food that ends up going bad. Making the tart shells while making the original pies was a few extra minutes and popping the tarts together was another five, after I took a look at what was in the fridge. The smile on happy faces, priceless.
Over the past few months, I have been posting a Kitchen Witch Alphabet on Facebook. P is for protect. Here are a few sentences from that post.
” This living breathing planet offers us an abundance of magical plants for healing and spiritual uses. The food we catch, grow and gather is a gift that allows us to continue living and there are many, many things making that gift more and more difficult to give.
The options are many to honour Gaia, not just Earth Day, April 22nd. A kitchen witch worth her salt and pepper chooses every day to act respectfully in her relationship with Mother Earth. ”
I am in no way suggesting that eight blueberry tarts compensates for the 80,000,000 gallons of water used each year for fracking in drought ridden California and other questionable practices happening in British Columbia, where I live and around the world. I am hopeful though that by taking ongoing respectful care of the products we each purchase and grow, we can together encourage more choices that honour the planet, showing more care for each other and for the generations to come.
If not us then who?
Blueberry Cinnamon Cheese Tarts from My Kitchen Wand
