Lest I run the risk of sounding like I am a corporate shill for a publishing house or for a high-end celebrity chef, I'm only going to say this once: if you want to find new ways to fall in love with vegetables, buy anything ever written by Yotam Ottolenghi. He's not a vegetarian but he cooks veggies like a superstar, and should I ever find myself in front of him I would fall to the ground and kiss the hem of his robe. Chef's apron (so long as it was the beginning of his shift). Whatever. He is that good.This recipe is taken from his book Plenty, which is easily one of the best cookbooks I've ever bought and is sort of a gateway drug. After buying it (family, please do take note), his other books have ended up on my Amazon wish list and you all know how I feel about the items on my Amazon wish list: Shop early, shop often. All contributions to my cookery appreciated.So. Here is a beautiful potato tatin recipe, adapted from Plenty. Ottolenghi calls it a "surprise" tatin, I suppose because tatins are usually desserty and sweet, and this one's surprise is its savory goodness. Nevertheless, it works. I've made this for us, and for guests, and it hasn't disappointed yet. Be forewarned: this tatin does take a while, but it's all easy work--the hardest part comes right at the end. It's a great recipe for kitchen puttering on those long, slow Sundays. You'll need:

• 1 pint grape tomatoes
• 1 1/2 lb unpeeled potatoes, cut in 1-inch cubes
• 1 medium-to-large onion, thinly sliced
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 2 tsp butter
• oregano sprigs/thyme sprigs/rosemary, all to taste and to flavor preference
• 1 4-oz package of goat cheese, sliced
• 1 puff pastry sheet, thawed
• salt/pepper/olive oil, as necessary

Preheat your oven to 275°. Take a sheet of puff pastry out of the freezer and put it in the fridge to thaw. Wash the pint of grape tomatoes and cut them all in half. The tomatoes are going into the oven to slow-roast for 45 minutes, so toss them with some oil, salt and pepper, and arrange them on a baking sheet. Face down, face up, it doesn't matter, since you need to stir everything about half-way through the roasting time and really, we needn't be so fussy. Put them in, let the oven do the work for you. You can, if you're pressed for time, use store-bought sundried tomatoes, but, two things: 1) If you're pressed for time, don't make this recipe and 2) When you can work with this......why settle for anything less?  Side note: should you discover, when you assemble the tatin, that you have more tomatoes than you want or need, then the worst thing that happens is you have leftover slow-roasted tomatoes. You'll thank me when you eat them in your salad tomorrow.Moving on.While the tomatoes roast, prepare your potatoes and onions. Give the potatoes a good scrub, then cut them and put them in a pot of water so you can boil them. You do want them to be roughly uniform one-inch cubes (but don't make yourself crazy when some chunks aren't exactly an inch; it will be fine), and yes, cook them thoroughly, but not to the point of mushiness. Drain them and set aside. Slice the onion in thin slices and toss in a big saute pan with some oil and let them get beautifully soft and golden, stirring as necessary so they don't stick and overly brown. Set aside.As far as the timing of this recipe goes, it's very important that all your ingredients are fully prepped before you move on to the next step. You can park this recipe here for several hours or overnight, if you're not planning to move forward. If you are, then make sure your potatoes are boiled and drained, the tomatoes are roasted, the onions are golden. If you're using fresh herbs, make sure they're washed and dried. If you're using dried herbs, have them at the ready. Because next you'll be making the caramel, and it will not wait for you.Take a 9-inch cake pan and brush the sides and bottom with oil, then cut a piece of baker's parchment to fit the cake pan. Brush the top of the parchment with oil, too.Take a small pan and add in the butter and sugar. Let both things start to soften in the heat.And then stir stir stir and keep stirring until you get a beautiful, rich brown caramel, which we will NOT stick our fingers in and taste because we never mess with hot sugar and we want to avoid second-degree burns as much as possible.Then pour this into your prepared cake pan. Get it to smooth out as evenly as possible, but bear in mind that it won't be smooth because the caramel will start to seize as soon as it leaves the heat.Top with herbs, then start to arrange potatoes so they sit, relatively neatly, in a tight but not necessarily super-tight formationThen layer with the gorgeous roasted tomatoes, kind of sticking them in the crevasses between potatoes.And then layer with onions, doing much the same thing.Add on the layer of goat cheese and then top everything with the puff pastry, rolling it long enough so it's an even thickness that you can trim and tuck into the sides of the pan.A word about puff pastry: to dock, or not to dock? It's a good question. If you dock it (i.e., poke the dough a bunch of times with a fork so the steam that makes the pastry rise escapes instead), it won't puff as dramatically, but will still be delicious. If you don't dock it, you'll get a super-puffy crust that can be intimidating when you have to finish the tatin. It's up to you. I've made it both ways, and they're equally beneficial...though docked dough is probably easier, in the end, to work with. It's your call.Once the dough is placed and tucked, you can once again park this recipe in the fridge overnight; just take it out about an hour before you're ready to cook it, so it can warm up to room temperature before it goes in the oven. If you're ready to finish the tatin, then raise the oven temp to 400° and put it in the oven for 25 minutes. After 25 minutes, rotate it in the oven (if yours cooks unevenly, like mine does), then drop the temp to 350° and let it bake for another 10 minutes. The puff pastry should be beautifully golden and (if undocked) quite puffy.Let this settle for a few minutes, then (this is the hardest part) place a large serving plate over the top of the crust and flip the whole thing, inverting the tatin onto the serving place like it's a great big savory upside-down cake. Pie. Tatin.Which is really what it is.We had friends over for dinner, and served this with parmesan roasted acorn squash, a fattoush salad and chocolate panna cotta with pepita brittle (recipe coming soon). For real. It was almost too good.So you see, nothing in this recipe is hard, though it does take time. The hardest part is the inversion to the serving plate at the end. Work out with some wrist weights if that makes you anxious. Otherwise...enjoy!