Pissaladière (French Anchovy Onion Tart)
Pissaladière is one of my favorite Provencal culinary specialties! Here’s an orignal recipe, ultra tasty and easy to make, with a few tips for preparing the dough from scratch.
Table of contents
Pissaladière, to be pronounced “pea-salad-i-air” is a culinary specialty from the Nice region of France. It’s basically a tart made of a pizza dough traditionally topped with caramelized onions, anchovies and black olives. Often served as a starter or aperitif, I personally like to serve it as a main course, accompanied by a salad.
Ingredients
You don’t need many ingredients to make the famous Niçoise pissaladière, and they’re pretty economical too!
- Dough: I recommend making your own pizza dough. You can, of course, buy store-bought pizza dough to save time. To make your homemade dough, you need :
- Flour: All-purpose flour.
- Water: Lukewarm
- Yeast: I like to use dry yeast for this recipe. If you only have fresh yeast, double the quantities and activate it beforehand by mixing it with a little flour, warm water and sugar taken from the total quantities and leave to stand for 15 minutes.
- White sugar: Even though this is a savory recipe, sugar helps feed the yeast and make the dough rise.
- Salt
- Onions: Choose large yellow onions. 3 will suffice if they’re big enough.
- Olives: The traditional Niçoise recipe is prepared with unpitted black olives from Nice! Although it’s not always practical to choose non-stoned black olives, as they are more intense in flavor.
- Anchovies: Anchovy fillets are very intense in taste too! Don’t use too much of it or your Pissaladière will be too salty. When I choose my anchovies, I always make sure that they are marinated in olive oil and not a refined oil of lesser quality. You can use the oil from the anchovies to brown your onions!
- Herbes de Provence: To spice things up! If you don’t have any, use dried thyme, rosemary or oregano.
- Olive oil: For sautéing onions.
You’ll find the exact quantities in the recipe card.
Preparation
Pizza dough
Pour the flour, sugar and dry yeast into a large mixing bowl or the bowl of a food processor. Mix (with the hook if using a food processor) and gradually add the water until the ingredients begin to form a dough.
Note: The water temperature must be between 75-95 °F (25°C-35°C) to avoid killing the yeast.
Then add the salt and olive oil and continue kneading for 3-4 minutes until you obtain a homogeneous dough.
Note: Avoid putting the salt in direct contact with the yeast, as this makes it less active, which is why it is added later.
Return the dough to the bowl, cover with a clean towel and leave to rise for 1.30 to 2 hours. You can also leave it overnight in the fridge, it will rise slowly.
Caramelized onions
Mince the onions. Heat a drizzle of olive oil in a large skillet, then add the onions (in two batches if your skillet isn’t big enough). Allow to caramelize for 10 minutes, then season with salt and pepper. Do the same with the other part of the onions.
Return all the onions to the pan and continue to caramelize over medium heat. Lower the heat and cook over low heat for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally. If the onions stick to the bottom of the pan, add a little water and stir well.
Note: My personal touch is to add a little balsamic vinegar to enhance the taste of the onions and help the caramelization. It really does make all the difference!
Assembly and baking
Once the dough has rested and doubled in volume, press to deflate. Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough on a lightly floured work surface into a circle about 28-30 cm in diameter.
Pinch the edges of the dough with your index finger and thumb to form a border. Place the caramelized onions on the dough, spread well to the edge and sprinkle with herbes de Provence.
Add the anchovies in a grid pattern reminiscent of the traditional recipe, then place the black olives in each rectangle.
Bake for 10 minutes until the edges of the pastry start to turn golden. Then leave to rest for a few minutes on a grill before serving!
Ideas for variations
Here are a few ideas to vary this traditional pissaladière recipe!
- Puff pastry: To save time and get an ultra-flaky pissaladière, replace pizza dough with store-bought or homemade puff pastry.
- Red onions: For a more original version, replace yellow onions with red onions.
- Tomatoes and capers: Replace the black olives with cherry tomatoes and capers.
- Sardines: Replace anchovies with canned sardines – they’re delicious too!
- Vegetarian: For a vegetarian or even vegan version, replace the anchovies with sun-dried tomatoes.
Ideas for serving with pissaladière
If you’re serving this pissaladière as an aperitif, you can serve it with salmon rillettes, green tapenade orhomemade hummus. For a touch of freshness, I like serve it with a cold cucumber soup.
You can also serve this pissaladière as a main course, accompanied by a simple green salad with vinaigrette or a tomato and cucumber salad. I recently served it with my white bean and tuna salad, and everyone loved it!
More Provencal recipes
- Vegetable Tian à la Provençale
- Bouillabaisse (easy recipe)
- Tomatoes à la Provençale
- Tarragon Pesto
- Apricot Tart with Almond Cream
Frequently Asked Questions
Pissaladière can be kept for 3 days in the refrigerator in an airtight closed container.
Yes, you can either prepare the pissaladière entirely in advance and reheat it for 5 to 10 minutes at 350 °F (180°C) just before serving. Alternatively, you can prepare the pizza dough and caramelized onions in advance. Assemble and bake just before serving.
Yes, you can! Place the whole pissaladière or some slices in a freezer bag or airtight container and store in the freezer for up to 3 months.
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Recipe card
Pissaladière (French Anchovy Onion Tart)
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Ingredients
Pizza dough
- 2 cups + 1 tablespoon of flour 250 g
- 2/3 cup lukewarm water 137 ml
- 1 teaspoon dry yeast 3.5 g
- 1 teaspoon salt 6 g
- 1/2 tsp. sugar
- 1/2 tablespoon olive oil
Toppings
- 3 large yellow onions (1.5 lb or 750 g)
- 12-20 anchovy fillets in oil
- 14 black olives
- 1 tablespoon herbes de Provence or Italian seasoning or a mix of thyme, rosemary, oregano
- 2 tablespoons of olive oil
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar optional
- Salt and pepper
Instructions
Pizza dough
- Pour the flour, sugar and dry yeast into a large mixing bowl or the bowl of a food processor. Mix (with the hook if you’re using a food processor) and gradually add the warm water* until the ingredients form a paste.
- Mix in the salt** and olive oil, and knead for 3-4 minutes until smooth.
- Return the dough to the bowl, cover with a clean towel and leave to rest for 1.30 to 2 hours, or overnight in the fridge for a slow rise. The dough must double in volume.
Caramelized onions
- Mince the onions and sauté in a large skillet with a drizzle of olive oil. Allow to caramelize for 10 minutes, then season with salt and pepper.
- Continue cooking over medium heat until the onions are golden brown (15-20 more minutes), adding a little water they start to stick to the skillet. Finish by adding the balsamic vinegar (optional) and stir.
Assembly and baking
- Preheat oven to 400 °F (210°C), fan oven.
- Roll out the pizza dough into a circle about 11-12 inches (28-30 cm) in diameter on a lightly floured work surface. Pinch the edges to form a border.
- Spread the caramelized onions over the dough and sprinkle with herbes de Provence. Arrange the anchovies and black olives in a grid pattern.
- Bake for 10 minutes, until the edges of the pissaladière are golden brown. Let stand for a few minutes on a wire rack before serving.
