Une tarte aux courgettes...

...avec rondelles de saucisson et oignons confits

If it's summer, you can be sure there's a race to keep up with the courgettes. Our two plants are already producing more than we can easily incorporate into our menus and diet. One way to cook them is to bake them in a pie shell. By the way, courgettes is both French and British for what we Americans call summer squash or zucchini.

The first step in making this tart is to cut up and slow-cook a big onion or two in vegetable oil or butter with bay leaves, thyme, a splash of white wine, and a tablespoon of honey. When the onions are tender — that takes 30 or 40 minutes — blind bake (pre-cook) a pie shell that you've bought at the supermarket or made yourself. spread the onions over the bottom of the pie shell. Save as much of liquid and oil that the onions cook in to drizzle over the top of the tart before you bake it.

The sausage I use to make this tart is called saucisson à l'ail in France — garlic sausage. It's a large pork sausage that is sold already cooked. You can see that's it's fairly lean. All you have to do is cut it into rounds. Optionally, you can brown the rounds lightly in a frying pan before you put them in the tart over the slow-cooked onions.

Slice a zucchini or two, depending on their size, into thin rondelles as well. Blanch (par-boil) the slices for three or four minutes in boiling water or in a steamer pot (my preference). They will cook better in the oven, without drying out, if they're blanched first.

The other main flavor ingredient in this tart is cheese. It's really good with grated Parmesan — about three-quarters of a cup of it. Sprinkle some over the slices of sausage before you lay the zucchini rounds over the top. Sprinkle more cheese over the top of the zucchini rounds. Drizzle on the cooking juices from the slow-cooked onions that you saved earlier. Bake the tart in a hot oven for about 30 minutes, or until golden brown. Everything you put in it is already cooked, so it doesn't take long.