RECIPE
Apple Tarte Tatin
French Country Cooking with Edward Delling-Williams
Apple Tarte Tatin
Ingredients
- 1 cup flour
- 2 sticks butter
- 1 ¼ cups sugar
- water
- 1 ¼ cups brown sugar
- 12 medium-sized apples
- 1 lemon
- 1 cup Calvados (apple brandy)
- salt
Instructions
Rough Puff Pastry
- Firstly, you will need to make rough puff pastry. This is simple and easy, but messy. Make a rectangular pile of the flour on a clean flat surface, then lay out the butter cut into 1/16-inch-thick strips on top like tiles.
- Using your fingers make little dent impressions then sprinkle on some water using a tablespoon and fold over twice on itself. Repeat this process 3 times minimum. To help fold over, I use a bench scraper or bread cutter (something with a large flat surface). The idea here is to keep repeating the process until it roughly comes together.
- Depending on the temperature, you may need to keep popping it in the fridge for the butter to chill again to make sure the indents made with your fingers are nice and firm to catch the water. Don’t go mad with the water as it’s only a little and enough to bring it together. Once this is complete leave it in the fridge overnight to rest.
Tarte
- When you’re ready to cook, preheat the oven to 375 degrees (or 350 if using convection).
- Once you are ready to make the Tarte start by peeling the apples in a large bowl of cold water and adding the lemon juice into the bowl to stop the apples from coloring. Then remove, quarter, and de-core them.
- Next, put a heavy-bottomed pan onto medium heat and start to melt the brown sugar until it starts to color more, this is when you start adding the apples. You can make this as precise as you want. Sometimes, I like to just throw them all in, but be sure to drain them well first, as the caramel will spit if water gets put into it.
- Let the apples cook for a couple of minutes as we want them a nice deep brown color when we flip it out otherwise, they will be pale and unappetizing.
- While this is happening, you can roll out the pastry to a circular shape ready to lay over your pan on a flour-dusted flat surface.
- Turn back to the pan and add the calvados quickly followed by the pastry. Paint the top which will become the bottom with some beaten egg and pierce some holes in it to let the steam out.
- Place it into the oven for about 35 minutes but start checking at 30 minutes and every 5 minutes after.
- You are looking for the pastry to be a nice golden-brown color and totally cooked through. Once this has been achieved, remove the pan, and place a larger than the pan-sized plate on the top of it upside down, and very carefully and quickly flip it over. DO NOT remove the pan straight away, give it a couple of gentle taps and lift it slightly to peek. Hopefully, all the apples have released, and fallen properly but if they haven’t, give the pan another tap to give the apples a helping hand. Viola! Apple Tarte Tatin!