Another dish designed for skin health. I just adore it. It is heavenly, and usually when I cook it I find myself having to make much more of the filling than I need to actually make the tart, as I will happily munch through it as I go along.
1 large red onion
1 tbsp honey
1 large sheet of puff pastry
4 large cooked beetroot
100g goats cheese or feta
- Add a small amount of olive oil to a large saucepan. Cut the red onion into thin slices, and add to the oil, and sauté until they begin to soften. At this point, add the honey, and continue to cook until the onion takes on a caramelized texture.
- Roll out the ready-made puff pastry, to a size that is large enough to fit a 25 cm/10 inch round tart tin. Once rolled out, line the tin with pastry, and trim as necessary.
- Begin by blind baking the pastry, covering the pastry with grease proof paper and filling with ceramic baking beads, or even some dried beans.
- Once the pastry has been blind baked for about 10 minutes, remove the baking beads and paper to reveal the pastry case. Add the caramelized onions first, ensuring the whole base of the pastry case has been covered. Then dice the cooked beetroot, and sprinkle over the top of the onion layer. Lastly, break the cheese up into little pieces all over the beetroot and onion mixture.
- Return to the oven for around 10 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown and the cheese is softening and beginning to get a few brown edges.
- Serve with a side salad.
Medicinal Properties
Beetroot
Beetroot is a very powerful food for liver health. The deep purple pigment in beetroot, that stains anything and everything, is given to the plant by a powerful chemical called beta cyanin. Beta cyanin is known to be a powerful stimulant of the phase 2 detoxification pathways in the liver. This helps to speed up and improve the way the liver deals with waste materials. The better the liver is functioning, the better the skin looks. This is because when the liver is overburdened, the skin is often used as a rapid route of elimination, which is believed by many to aggravate certain skin conditions such as eczema.
Red Onions
As has been mentioned before, the whole allium family is rich in sulphur to support extracellular matrix structure and function. Onions are also a very rich source of a prebiotic compound called inulin. This special type of sugar can actually be used as a food source by the good bacteria in the gut, to enhance their growth. Healthy gut flora is vital for good digestive function. If our digestive tract is healthy and we are breaking down food properly, and properly eliminating, this will be reflected in our skin.
