Monday, October 20, 2008

TART TATIN




What nicer way to spend a sunny late Autumn day than with a trip to the orchard. We have a really nice Winery & Orchard about 20mins away, The St Croix Vineyard. Yes, you read this correctly a vineyard in Minnesota! Maybe not the Nations best wine but not too bad. We did a tasting then made our way to the apple store where we stocked up on delicious crisp sweet Honeycrisps, some Cortlands and tasted a few more before purchasing some Apple Cider which we will drink on a cold Minnesota day, hopefully out in the yard round the fire pit with some good friends. It will be our farewell to Autumn. We then took a stroll through the now bare vineyard and down through the apple orchard.
I now have to decide what to do with all these apples. Most I will store to use through the winter but for now I want to prepare something yummy. My husband suggests a tart tatin. So I set to work. I was lucky enough to attend a cooking demonstration hosted by a local restaurant, OCEANAIRE. It is one of my favourite places to eat in Minneapolis, and the demonstration was really enjoyable, and one of the dishes was a tart tatin. It seemed really doable, and was, I have made it on many occasions, with excellent results. Guess I maybe got a bit too complacent. I followed the recipe as I had in the past, but the phone rang during the first phase, and maybe I let the caramel cook a little too long! However I completed the recipe. The results were, let me see, less than perfect but totally edible, especially with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top. But perfection or not I wanted to let you in on this recipe.

1 sheet frozen puff pastry
4 oz unsalted butter
1/2 cup sugar
9 apples peeled, cored & quartered (approx)

Preheat oven to 425f (220c)

Roll & cut pastry into a 10" circle, chill in fridge until ready to use
Spread butter thickly onto base of 10" skillet, preferably cast iron.
Sprinkle sugar evenly over the butter.
Arrange as many apple slices as will fit vertically on sugar in tight concentric circles. Apples will be above rim of skillet.
Cook apples over moderate heat for 20 mins.
Put skillet into oven, over piece of foil, to catch drips. Bake for 20 mins
Remove and lay over the pastry. Bake for another 20 mins.
Remove from oven and leave for cool for at least 10 mins.
Just before serving invert onto serving plate. Replace any apples that stick to skillet. ( Don't worry if there are black spots: they won't affect the taste.
Serve immediately.

Follow these instructions and you will be serving up a wonderful tart tatin. I am always asked for this recipe.
Thank you OCEANAIRE for sharing this recipe with me.

3 comments:

Clumbsy Cookie said...

Tarte Tatin is such a great simple dessert. Sounds posh but anybody can do it! A little bit dark caramel never hurt anybody, specially with ice cream, ahahah!

the chef said...

Cheers from one celtic cook to another! Thanks for sharing this recipe with the blogoshpere. I too have recently been to St. Croix Vineyards and had quite a time. You have truly honored this recipe with the proper seasonal ingredient. Happy cooking.

Pat said...

That looks very very scrummy!!!!!! and your Cocktail looks delicious too!!!