À Table: Tarte Flambée + 20 Questions

A portrait from Alsace

Our weekly “À Table”dinner series gets its name from the mealtime call to the dining table. Since 2018, we have invited friends new and old to share a meal focusing on food, music and traditions from various places in the Francophone world. It has proved to be a fun way to connect with friends and practice our spoken French. Here on our site, we share portraits of some of our favorite meals so that you can easily do a version of the same chez vous Bon Appétit!

One of the O.G. À Tables, we have been serving this Alsacian treat to anyone who will come help us practice our spoken French.

recipe

Tarte Flambée

tarte flambée on the table with hungry hands
hungry hands grabbing the fresh tarte flambée

Whether you call it Tarte Flambée (French) or Flammekuche (Alsacian), this flatbread originating in the Alsace at the border of France and Germany, is delicious.

tarte flambée w/mushrooms, fontina and truffle salt

I think I first enjoyed it in Germany, where they refer to it as Flammkuchen), but the basic principle is a thin dough, with crème fraîche smeared across it, and a selection of toppings. Most traditional would be onions and lardons (bacon), with Forestière (with mushrooms), or Gratinée (with Gruyère cheese) close seconds.

getting tarte flambée ready for it's first time in the oven

It isn’t the easiest to cook for a hungry crowd, but if I could do it a dozen times in a tiny Brooklyn apartment as we all crowded around our table-cum-kitchen counter, you can do it, too.

tarte flambée fixings

One solution is to roll out the dough ahead of time and stack them separated with parchment paper (which you will use to cook them anyway), This helps the process go a bit quicker, so that when one tarte comes out of the oven, the next can go right in. Your hangry kids will thank you.

rolling out tarte flambee dough to be ready ahead
rolled out ahead and stored between sheets parchment paper

Bonus

Game: 20 Questions

This French-ified game comes with big thanks to Sarah and family who happened to come over on an À Table evening that we didn’t have our printed Parlez Français le Jeux game because we had forgotten we had lent it to a friend.

Sarah suggested the game 20 Questions, but played in French, and I had to wonder why I had never thought of that?! Brilliant!

You probably already know how to play, but if not, here is a very brief tutorial:

One person chooses a person, place, or thing, and keeps it in their head, not revealing it to anyone. Then, the guessing begins! Other players must ask questions that can only be answered with a “yes” or “no,” in an attempt to figure out what the person has chosen to “be,” and with each answer the subsequent questions should bring players closer to the answer. The most fun way is to take turns going around the table asking question as a “team,” trying to figure it out before getting to 20.

20 questions

To get you started with some of the basic questions, we have this printable on our Etsy page here.

20 questions and quiche on the dinner table

Or, if you just need more explanation on the game itself, head to the 20 Questions Wikipedia pages,

music

French Favs

For this À Table installment, we’ll stay with the greatest hits: our continually-updated playlist of favorite French-language songs. Put it on shuffle and enjoy.

Santé and bon appètit!

cheers over tarte flambée