Decadent Holiday Galette
Indulgent. Decadent. Luxurious. Lavish in taste and presentation.
What makes a dessert decadent? Luxurious ingredients, rich, smooth, and indulgent.
Here’s a peek inside my winter pantry filled with holiday inspiration. I just need to keep reminding myself that Holiday Time is arriving fast! Too fast!
Thank you for your support and for keeping this newsletter going and growing. I have enjoyed every minute of sharing with you. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
xo, Pat
These apple galettes are so simple to make, be sure to save an extra one or two for friends who drop by or when you want to put your feet up and enjoy a cozy afternoon by the fire.
Ahh, autumn. It needs to be 4 seasons long. Surely one of the best fragrances of the season is juicy, ripe apples that appear in our farmers markets and rickety roadside stands. The aroma of falling leaves, toasting pecans, roasting turkey stuffed with chestnut dressing, and mulled cider make this my favorite time of the year.
This simple dessert can be made before Thanksgiving Day. Be sure to prep before Thursday, chop, mix, and bake - anything you can get done. I make all my casseroles, and salad dressing and chop up the veggies the day before. That way there’s no more stress when Thursday arrives.
For heaven’s sake if you’re going to eat pie, make sure it’s worth the calories, and don’t just settle for one of those dull packaged crusts just because you think your pastry skills are awful.
There are so many ways to get creative with this.
Nearly every cookbook on my shelf reflects our mutual love affair with apples and pastry. We see apple pie everywhere but hardly ever find one worth eating. Unfortunately, most are just slabs of commercially made pastry encased in chunks of canned apple filling. No, thank you. With a little effort you can create a memorable galette made with delicious and healthy ingredients. That’s a promise!
With just a few ingredients and only a bit of sugar, the apples can shine. I use organic apples which will be a lot smaller. I look for ones that will hold their shape after baking like Honeycrisp, Pink Lady, and Golden Delicious. For more tartness and acidity you can mix the apples to include Granny Smith. Brushing the crust with heavy cream helps achieve a bit of shine and makes it look fabulous. If you can’t find cream in your fridge, just use lightly beaten egg or milk. This is so simple, that even my granddaughter can make it - just a little easier than rolling a pie crust and making it fit into a pie pan. For most of my friends, that’s a daunting task! Oh my!
( footnote: Grandaughter is 5). You can do this! A galette is just a rustic, free-form tart made with a single crust of pastry. No need to stress about fitting the dough into a pie plate or crimping the side to make it look picture perfect.
Apple Galette
Get creative and sprinkle in a few cranberries!
Serves 8-10 (or 6 very hungry people)
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 cup sugar, plus more for sprinkling
Flour for rolling
1 disk sweet tart crust, chilled (instructions below)
3 small apples
2 tablespoons heavy cream or egg yolk ( brush on the crust)
2 tablespoons apricot jam
Turn on the oven to 375 degrees. Combine the cinnamon with the sugar in a small bowl.
On a lightly floured surface, use a lightly floured rolling pin to roll the dough out into an 11-inch circle. Transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet.
Cut each apple around its core into 4 pieces. No need to peel. Cut straight down and slightly rotate the apple between cuts, leaving a square core. Discard the core and thinly slice the apple pieces into half-moon shapes. Make the apple slices like a shingle in overlapping rows. Leave a 2-inch border all the way around. Sprinkle the 1/4 cup sugar-cinnamon mixture evenly over the apples. Top with the pieces of butter.
Lift and press the edges of the dough up over the fruit, pleading as you go. Brush the crust with heavy cream or egg yolk and sprinkle with sugar.
Bake until the crust is golden brown and the apples are tender - about 30 minutes. Stir the apricot jam and run it through a fine mesh sieve or slotted spoon to remove any large pieces of fruit. Brush the apples lightly with the jam. Cool slightly before serving.
A few tips on making the crust
This is a foolproof dough, light and buttery. This is my go-to galette dough recipe you may use for sweet and savory galettes. There is hope for all of us with this easy recipe I’m going to share. There is no sugar in this recipe because it’s baked with sweet apples.
There’s a big difference between American butter and European butter. European butter is a cultured butter that’s been churned for a longer period to achieve at least 82 percent butterfat. American butter is about 80 percent. It may seem small but it makes a difference in taste and consistency. Our US butter is not usually cultured so it has a less tangy, more neutral flavor. (I like to use Irish butter for just about everything)
I find making the dough in a food processor is the most foolproof and easy way to do it.
Bake 375 degrees for about 30 - 35 minutes
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, more to flour the surfaces
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
10 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
4-5 tablespoons ice-cold water
1 large egg yolk
Instructions
First, place flour and salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Pulse 3-4 times to mix. Add the cubed cold butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse sand. (You want the butter pieces to look like small lentils. The process takes about ten 1-second pulses.)
Next, add the cold water and continue to pulse one tablespoon at a time until the dough starts to collect on the sides and forms into a ball. I think this, the fact that the dough forms into a ball giving a foolproof visual cue of doneness, is the part that makes this recipe foolproof.
Dump the dough onto a lightly floured surface and form it into a 4-inch disk Wrap it tightly with plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge for at least 45 minutes or up to 2 days.
Take it out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter for 10 to 15 minutes before you are ready to roll it out.
Roll it into a 12-inch circle about 1/8 inch thick on a lightly floured surface and transfer it onto a sheet of parchment paper.
To finish it off, fill it with your filling leaving at least a 3-inch border around the edge. Then fold the outer 3-inch dough over the filling, pleating it gently every 2 to 3 inches.
Finally, brush the dough with a beaten egg yolk to get a good golden crust.
Thank you for your recipe!