TWD - Parisian Apple Tartlet

When I first turned to the page in Baking:  From My Home to Yours to read this recipe, I saw the scrumptious photo and was very happy.  Then I read the recipe itself, and was even happier.  So easy to make!  And I was pretty sure everyone would love it!  Although Julia can be fickle about desserts!  But still - amid all the drywall dust and mess of toys and STUFF everywhere, this recipe, for the Parisian Apple Tartlet, which was chosen by Jessica of My Baking Heart, looked blessedly simple.  In a good way.  Cut some circles out of a sheet of puff pastry dough, cut up some apples, a bit of brown sugar, a dot of butter and vwalla, as the French say, she is done!

And then some damn voice in my fool head spoke up eagerly and said this to me:

"Hey!  Why don't you MAKE your own puff pastry dough?  That would be a cool tutorial to post in addition to the Tuesdays with Dorie entry!"

And the smart voice must have been asleep at that point, because the rest of me went ahead with the make-your-own-puff-pastry-dough plan.

And THEN, because it had the opportunity, that damn voice in my fool head ALSO said this:

"Why don't you make TWO batches of puff pastry dough?  You could do one the regular way, and use some whole wheat flour in the other one!  Wouldn't that be interesting?"

And, well, that's what I did.

But the Making Of The Puff Pastry Dough will be posted later, either tonight or tomorrow, because I just won't have time today.  I'm still picking up the pieces from yesterday. 

So we'll just skip all that for now.  Just trust that yes, I went ahead and did those damn fool things and ended up with a lump of regular puff pastry dough and a lump of 1/3 whole wheat puff pastry dough.  It occurs to me I should have gone ahead (because why not, at that point?) and made ANOTHER batch that was entirely whole wheat flour.  But I didn't.  And I might never ever to it, either.  I'm puffed out.

So.  On to the tartlet.

I used some of each dough in the making of these tartlets, by the way, and then completely forgot to do a taste comparison with the rest of the family.  But I've done one of my own, in the name of science and all that, and there's not a tremendous difference.  The partly whole wheat one looks a little prettier, to me, with faint brown speckles in it.  It has an ever-so-slight stronger wheat flavor, too, but it's nothing that screams "Non viva le difference pas!" or whatever "We don't like it made this way, you damn fool!" translates as.  I don't think I speak French all that well.

Here is some of the partly whole wheat flour dough rolled out and ready to be cut into circles:

See?  Pretty speckles.

Next, I peeled my apples and dropped them in a bowl of acidulated water to bide their time until I needed them for each tartlet.  I'd counted up my apples and then cut out circles of dough accordingly.

Except that I hadn't paid attention when reading the directions, and so I thought it was a WHOLE apple per tartlet, but it's not.  It's half an apple.  I'm a dolt.  I had eleven apples (this sounds like one of Alex's math problems) and so I cut out eleven circles.  (The number seems appropriate:  "This one goes to eleven!")  And then - well, I just gave up and figured I'd save the rest of the apples in their lemony bath for another day.  I was already running behind schedule - I didn't have time to cut out more circles.

Isn't that pretty?  I had to stop, mid frantic pace, to take several pictures of it.

And then I tried cutting the apple so it would look like the one in Dorie's book.  But my pieces of apple just didn't look as good as hers (which is not surprising.  She also probably counted right the first time.), so I cut them a bit smaller...and I still didn't like that, so I tried other shapes, other configurations, other designs, until finally I took all the last bits of one apple and chopped them up into smaller bits and dropped them onto my final circle of dough.  So THERE!

Only it turns out I didn't take a picture of that batch of tartlets at this stage.  Oops.

Then I sprinkled brown sugar and dotted with butter...

 

My Tartlet of Frustrated Chopping is the one on the bottom right, by the way.

And into the oven they went.

I only took a picture of the first batch when they came out.  I think I was careening into dinner preparations when the second batch finished up.

After dinner, the kids each had one.

Alex asked that I drizzle Hershey's syrup on his.  I hesitated, and suggested that it might not really go togther, and he said "Oh, come on, Mom!  Let me try it!  It'll be an experiment!"  So I drizzled (artistically) some chocolate syrup over his tartlet.  Julia had hers with whipped cream.  And then she ate the whipped cream and asked for "just a little bit more whipped cream?  please?  last time, I promise!"

Not surprisingly, Julia ate all her whipped cream, some of the apple, and a bite of the pastry.  Then she was full. 

Alex licked his plate clean. 

This morning I took the finished pictures for this post, and in looking at them, I think a picture of Alex licking a plate would have done a better job of expressing how yummy these little pastries truly are.

 

Thank you to Jessica for picking this treat!  You can find the recipe on her blog or in Dorie Greenspan's Baking:  From My Home to Yours.  And you can check out all the other pretty photos and commentary on all the other Tuesdays with Dorie blogs by clicking here!

Comments

[Tracey]

Kudos on making your own puff pastry! And two batches at that! I really wanted to make my own but it just didn't happen this week. Soon, though, hopefully. Your tartlets look fantastic! I especially love the one with the apples fanned out so beautifully. I really liked this recipe too!

[pamela]

Beautiful tarts! I can't get over all of you bakers who made their own dough! I'm so impressed and will have to try that...someday! I love the tart with the fanned out apples. Gorgeous!

[Nic]

Tartlet of Frustrated Chopping...hehe too funny!
They turned out beautiful and way to go with all that puff pastry making!

[Di]

Your tartlets all look great. I definitely think I should have cut my apples differently so they would have baked through. Oh, and now you've got me wanting to try puff pastry with whole wheat flour in it...

[Shandy]

You made your own puff pastry for these?? In fact, 2 types of puff pastry?? You are truly my hero! The whole apples was cute and I think you should be exhausted after all that! Simply beautiful!

[jules]

Very impressive to make two kinds of puff pastry. I bought mine. I cheat.

[Lynne]

they are like Tarte Tatin only the right way up :)

I am not surprised Alex had a good old lick...

[Leslie]

Hilarious post! That is totally the kind of optimistic thing I would do since time becomes very elastic when I'm baking. They look delicious and I'm intrigued by the 1/3 whole wheat puff pastry dough (but probably not enough to make it).

[Annette]

Your tarts look scrumptious! I admire you for making your own dough. I considered it, but it seemed like a lot of work, so it was store-bought for me. Someday I'll try it. I luuuuved the tartlets. And they're so easy! Great job!