TWD - French Apple Tart

A year ago yesterday our dog, Crash, passed away. We declared yesterday Crash day and honored him by eating his favorite food, chicken. Crash loved chicken more than life itself. He loved chicken so much that one time when he was eating his dog food my husband said chicken (in regards to our upcoming supper) and Crash spit out his dog food and whipped his head around looking for the chicken. I've never laughed so hard in my life. This dog loved chicken.

So yesterday instead of making the tart, I looked at pictures of Crash, ate a little chicken and cried a little. But it's ok. I'm ok and Crash is ok because I'm pretty sure he's getting all the chicken he's ever wanted.

miss you

Well don't let Crash fool you, he had a sweet tooth too and would've loved this tart. And I have always wanted to make a French tart. I love the thin apples carefully laid out in a circle. It really appeals to my OCD side. I have to channel that for good and not evil.

thank gravy for my mandolin!

After baking this little beaute, I didn't feel I had properly achieved the caramelized edges that were pictured in the book. So out comes the blow torch! Don't worry it's just a little guy. Just the perfect size to sizzle each apple edge. Yes more OCD. But look at this picture, wasn't it worth it?

torched to perfection

Ok, now for the 64 dollar question...what did I change? Well everything...almost. I did use granny smith's called for in the recipe. But I used this pie dough recipe. And for the apple mixture, I omitted the cinnamon and added 2 tablespoons of tamarind paste. Yes, tamarind. It's so tangy and sweet. I highly recommend everyone running out right now and getting some at your local latin store. Back? Good, eat some.

Here's our hostest with the mostest for this week, Laws of the Kitchen. She's a lawyer, so you better follow her recipe to the T! Don't do what I did and throw caution to the wind...well maybe throw a little.

later gaters

TWD - Riesling Poached Apricot Marzipan Tartlets

Ok, I promise, pinky promise that the next TWD recipe I will follow to a T! I swear it! What is the next one...popovers...sure I can do that, I can make a recipe and not tinker with it or completely change it up so that it's not even recognizable. Sure.

Now let me explain. I didn't do the galette because last TWD I did a galette (mini galettes). I send my baked goods to work with my husband and there are about 50 or so employees and I just want to make it easy for each or as many as possible to enjoy a bite. I know it's easy to cut up a pie or a galette, but come on who cuts it up equally so that you can have 50 pieces. Ok, that doesn't make sense, but you see what I'm getting at, right?

And since I did mini galettes last week I needed to do something different this week. So I went back to pie/tart shape. I think this is technically a tart dough, but please correct me if I'm wrong.

But maybe you are asking why did I do tartlettes this week, when I could have done them last week and did mini galettes this week and followed closer to the recipe, huh? The answer: I dunno. Moving on.

As for using apricots and marzipan and not mixed berries, well I did not realize but berry season is long gone  here at the base of the rockies. So dried apricots and marzipan from the cupboard made sense. Plus I had a wee bit of riesling that needed to be used up. So toss some sugar, cardamom pods, crushed vanilla beans and the riesling in the pot with the apricots and tada!

Vintage year

Now this week I did use the dough recipe. My recipe from last week is the foolproof pie dough from Cook's Illustrated. I LOVE IT! It's so freakin tasty and easy to throw together, it's supper, dupper flaky and is just great to eat, but kind of hard to work with. This week's recipe is super easy to work with, the cornmeal is fun and it's nice and sturdy and it tastes good too. I think I shall add it to my repertoire.

To see this magical recipe, go here and here and then here. (That last one was just for fun.)

Even though this wasn't a 2 am genius moment, I think I'll still call Martha and tell her about these.

Adorable, right?

And they are really the cutest things ever, well almost.

TWD - Honey Nectarine Galettes

This time I'm going to actually talk about the recipe. No shoe mysteries or what mischief I might have gotten into last Tuesday with the authorities. None of that! This is all recipe.

Now I do reserve the right to talk about any recipe, so we will be discussing biscotti, bibimbap and galettes.

So I don't think I conveyed how much I loved the biscotti recipe or rather the idea of it in my biscotti post. I, of course, didn't follow the recipe. Instead I used ginger and black sesame seeds and I felt this opened up a whole new world of possibilities! I made walnut and brown butter biscotti, almond and candied ginger biscotti, banana bread biscotti and wrote down recipes for ginger molasses biscotti and many others I can't even remember now. I was crazy over biscotti. I had even started the planning for sales at the holidays. I was going to be rich. Still might, but probably not over the biscotti. I loved it. But the love quickly faded. I now love bibimbap.

What? How? What the what? I transitioned from complete lovedom of a crunchy, better dunkin' than a donut cookie to a Koren rice dish. Well I'm fickle. (BTW that's the name of my brittle that I sell during the holidays, I'll tell you all about it sometime.)

So fun to say and even more fun to eat.

Bibimbap is the mac 'n cheese of the Korean world (I mean comfort food-wise, not the nutritional equivalent). And it only took one bite for me to fall in love with the idea. Not so much the actual dish that I took a bite of but nonetheless this is how I work. It's so easy, just cook up some rice, saute some spinach and a few other veggies that please you and add some fermented chili sauce and an egg. It's awesomely delicious and I would like to think healthy. I implore you to try it, either at some Korean joint or in your kitchen. If you want to be really adventurous, pick up some quail eggs at the Asian store too. You will be going to the Asian store because that's the only place you'll get fermented chili paste (Gochujang - you really want some now don't you). And while your there, pick up some of these little gelatin things for desert. They're Vietnamese, but come on think multi-cultural!

Ok, now galettes. I woke up at 2 in the morning (my standard idea time) and thought about how instead of a pie, that I should make little tiny galettes with honey and tarragon and nectarines and dried blueberries. I completely went 180 with this recipe. Well more like 140, I don't know. I don't do math.

Now, before we go further...let's take a look at the actual recipe and what these lovely folks did:

Here's "That Skinny Chick Can Bake", Liz's pie and the recipe. And our other host, "Manchego's Kitchen, I Just Cook Here", Hilary's pie and the recipe.

I didn't use the pie crust recipe, I didn't use fresh blueberries, I didn't use sugar and I didn't make a pie. BUT I did use the nectarines so it counts.

iPad for scale only, I don't generally serve food on it or use it as a table...much.

And if every one of my 2 am ideas ends up like this...then Mensa you missed out on this genius! Tarragon and honey and dried blueberries and nectarines and topped with a little lemon glaze are brilliant. BRILLANT! Even if I can't spell brilliant, these mini galettes are.


Update 8/1/2012 - So I send my weekly baked goods (including TWD goods) to my husbands office. Let's face it, I can't keep that many things at home while being at home most of the day. Even if I wasn't home, I would be driving around trying to get home so that I could eat those said things. So off they go, out the door to willing or not so willing folks. Well I guess they are willing because I just received flowers from his office saying Thank You! That is awesome. Thank you for making my day :)

Thanks :)