Apple Frangipane Galette, Almond Gonna Make This Again
Our weekly foray to the Farmer’s Market had me restocking my week’s worth of fruits and veggies。 I was looking for inspiration for a showstopper dessert to make for an outside, mask-on, socially-distance birthday celebration that evening. My farmers market/crew bud, Mary, chimed in with “my go-to dessert is David Lebovitz’s Apple Frangipane Galette. I’ve made it a zillion times and it always gets raves”. Search over, an apple galette would be perfect.
How do you like them apples?
I stopped at Live Earth Farm’s stand for apples. Not to brag or anything, ok, I am bragging. I successfully identified all their apple varieties. No small feat…Fuji, Gala, Pink Lady, Pippens and Jonagolds. As Sir Issac Newton might have said…
BOOM, APPLE DROP
Apples in hand, I headed home to make David Lebovitz’s Apple Frangipane Galette. I have just the right amount of almond paste left in the fridge from the Almond Plum Snack Cake. That’s a sign, right?
The galette starts with a pretty classic shortcrust. I do a deep dive into making crusts in a food processor with Claudia Fleming’s recipe for her Apple Crumb Tart with Bacon Toffee Sauce. The key point, do not over-process the dough. The crust is flaky, tender, and buttery. The layer of frangipane elevates this tart to another level. Don’t bother cleaning out your food processor after making the dough, just pop it back on the base and toss in the ingredients for the frangipane. I used Amaretto in place of the rum and added vanilla extract and a dash of salt, just to round out the flavor.
Roll the dough on parchment paper, and transfer the parchment to a baking sheet, just pick up the whole dang thing and plop it onto your sheet-easy. Spread the frangipane on the dough, 2 inches from edge.
Top with apples. Sprinkle with sugar. I am on a raw or turbinado sugar kick so I opted for raw sugar. Fold the dough over the apples creating pleasts that overlap.
Arrange the apples in concentric circles or just pile them up, it’s supposed to be rustic.
Brush edge with melted butter and sprinkle sugar on the crust. Drizzle the rest of the melted butter on the apples.
Serve the tart with honey or toffee sauce (extra from the last apple tart-worked like a charm!)
This galette is definitely going in my WOW factor dessert rotation!
Apple-Frangipane Galette
Ingredients
Galette Dough
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 stick unsalted butter (4 ounces) sliced into 8 cubes and chilled
- 6 tablespoons ice water
Apple Filling
- 6 medium apples, peeled, cored and slice 1/2 inch approximately 3 pounds any variety you like to bake with, I like a combo of Jonagolds, Fuji and Pippens or Mutsus
- 2 tablespoons unsalted or salted butter melted
- 4 tablespoons granulated sugar substitute raw or turnbinado
Frangipane
- 4 ounces almond paste crumbled
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 1 1/2 teaspoons all-purpose flour
- 1/8 teaspoon almond extract
- 6 tablespoons unsalted or salted butter at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon rum sub kirsch, Calvados or almaretto
- 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp salt if using unsalted butter
Instructions
Dough
- Place flour, sugar, and salt into the bowl of a food processor and pulse a few times to combine. Add chilled butter and process until butter is broken into pieces about the size of peas. Uneven size pieces of butter is to be expected and larger bits will make for a flaky crust when baked.
- Add all the ice water at once and process until the dough begins to hold together. (Note: this whole process can also be done with a pastry blender or a stand mixer.)
- Turn dough out onto a large piece of plastic wrap. Wrap in the plastic wrap and shape dough into a round 5-inch disk. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes or up to 2 days. Dough can also be frozen for up to 1 month.
- Peel, core, and cut apples into 1/2-inch thick slices.
Frangipane
- Process almond paste, sugar, flour, salt if using, and almond extract in a food processor until almond paste is in fine pieces. Add butter and process until completely incorporated, then add egg, vanilla and rum. Continue processing until almond paste is as smooth as possible. If you do see tiny bits of almond paste, they will disappear with baking.
- Store frangipane in the refrigerator for up to 1 week, or freeze for up to 1 month. Bring it back to room temperature before using.
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Putting it all together!
- Place a large sheet of parchment paper on your counter or directly on the baking sheet and lightly dust it with flour. Place dough on top of parchment and spread a large piece of plastic wrap or parchment on top of the dough. Roll dough out between the parchment and plastic wrap into a rough circle, 14 inches in diameter. Lift and rotate to prevent sticking while rolling. Place on baking sheet if rolled on counter.
- Spread all the frangipane over the dough, leaving a 2-inch border all around. Place apple slices either in concentric circles or pile on top of the frangipane. Fold the border of the dough over the apples and brush half the melted butter over the crust and the rest over the apples. Sprinkle half the sugar over the crust and the remaining over the apples.
- Bake for about 1 hour, or until the crust is brown and apples are tender. Rotate halfway thru baking. Slide galette off the parchment onto a wire rack to cool when done baking.
- Serve warm or at room temperature. Top with a drizzle of good honey or caramel sauce. Or serve with vanilla ice cream.
- Galette is best eaten the day it's baked.
