French Apple Tart
This tart is insanely easy to execute. Don't dither. Go coinvent and buy the ready made puff pastry. Quick and easy, it is perfect for a dinner party dessert or just a general home baking treat. We used Korean Pears', just because we wanted to experiment but Cox's apples will be perfect. Alongside the Quatre Épices and the flavoured whipped cream garnish, this is epic. You won't want to share.
20'+20'
preparation & cooking time
8
serve
Quatre Épices
spice
Ingredients
- Ready made roll out puff pastry sheet (320g)
- 2 x Egg yokes
- 3 tbsp of Apricot Jam
- 2 x Korean Pear's or 4 x Cox's apples
- Unsalted butter - melted (50g)
- 2 tsp of Quatre Épices
- 50g of brown sugar
Garnish to serve
- 300ml of double cream lightly whipped
- 4 tbsp of runny honey
- ½ tsp of Quatre Épices
- 100g of toasted chopped walnuts
Okay. So this apple tart is not technically an apple tart. We used a Korean Pear, which is sometimes known as a "Pryus Pyrifolia". This has several different names. Asian Pear, Japanese Pear, Taiwanese Pear, Nashi apple, apple pear or simply "bae" in Korea. We would say apple pear is the perfect definition as it has the bite of an apple but the taste of a pear. We randomly went to our local Korean shop and there was an abundance of Korean Pears'.
They were not cheap and we are completely unsure if they are stocked all year around. However inspired by the great desert chef - James Martin, you could use Cox apples as they have the right bite with a sweet complex taste that we find suits baking very well.
For absolute convience we bought some ready made puff pastry sheet.
Method
- Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C (390F)
- Keeping the pastry on the greaseproof paper it comes with, roll it out fully. It should be 30cm x 20cm. Place it straight onto your largest oven baking tray.
- Using a sharp knife you need to score a 2 cm frame around the whole edge of the rolled out pastry. Effectively it looks like a picture frame. This is done so that the border rises away from the rest of the tart, to give it an edge. Do not cut the whole way through the pastry as you want the border to rise but still remain intact.
- Using the prongs of a fork or a bread knife, score the pastry all over, working from the centre to the scored edge perimeter.
- Brush all of the pastry right up to the outside edge with the eggs yoke. You may need 3 egg yokes but 2 should suffice.
- Spread the apricot jam all over the inside scored edge with the back of a table spoon. You could use any jam. Apple or apricot might be best.
- Core the fruit, cut in half, top to bottom. Slice very thinly, the Korean Pear/Cox apple. Place the slightly stacked half moon apple slices in parallel rows. Simply fill in all the gaps and making it look pretty.
- Brush with half the melted butter. Then for the best bit. Sprinkle with the brown sugar and our French spice mix Quatre Épices.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes at 200 degrees C. It was 20 minutes in our oven, but be sure to check at 20 minutes.
Garnish
- Toast the walnuts for 5 minutes in the oven same temperature and finely chop them on removal.
- Fold in the lightly whipped cream, honey, chopped walnuts and a 1/2 tsp of Quatre Épices
- If you have time put the cream in the freezer for 20 minutes before you serve. It will give a great texture with the tart.
Food Styling by Jennifer Pallian