Cheese, bacon & mushroom tart

A simple little dish I made for dinner on Wednesday night :-)  Here's the recipe:

250g pastry (I used puff as I had a ready-made pack I wanted to use up but I'm sure the tart would be just as good using shortcrust)

a little butter (for greasing the dish)

4 large eggs

150ml milk (I used whole milk as that is what I had already open but you could use semi-skimmed or even soya milk, come to that)

200g cheddar cheese, preferably mature for flavour, grated

250g mushrooms (I used chestnut mushrooms but use whatever variety you prefer), sliced

250g bacon (I used back as that is what I had to hand but streaky would be good, too)

 a little olive oil, for frying

salt ~ optional

freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 180C (gas mark 4).  Lightly grease a 20-25cm pie dish.  Roll out the pastry to fit the dish.

Fry the rashers of bacon in a little olive oil until crisp.  Set aside on a plate lined with kitchen paper.  Fry the sliced mushrooms in the same pan ~ you may need to add a little more oil.

Beat the eggs and milk together in a bowl.  Mix in the grated cheese and add freshly ground black pepper.  I didn't add any salt since I think there is plenty in both the cheese and the bacon ~ but you may wish to, of course :-)

Lay the bacon in the bottom of the pastry shell, then add the mushrooms and finally pour over the egg mixture.

Bake for approximately 40-45 minutes, until the filling is nicely set and golden.  Keep an eye on the tart towards the end of the cooking time; I had to move my dish lower in the oven as the pastry was starting to get a little too brown!

Serves 4-6, depending on appetite ;-)

I served the tart with couscous and baby spinach leaves.  A nice crisp green salad would be good, too, or lightly steamed vegetables such as green beans.

As I say, it's a very simple dish which I made up as I went along using ingredients I had to hand.  Now that I know it is good and tasty I will experiment with other fillings.  It could easily be made into a vegetarian dish, for instance, by simply leaving out the bacon.  I'm thinking that a layer of baby spinach leaves would be nice, or sliced and lightly fried tomatoes or onions.  It would also be a good way to use up cooked leftover veggies :-)