Thin Apple Tarts

When I dream, I dream in French…Soup au Pistou, Fricassee de Poulet, Endives a la Flamande, and for dessert Tarte au Pommes and this dessert is part of the dream that is so simple to make a reality. Thin Apple Tarts, le Bijouxs!

So, what is the French connection to Bijouxs? First, there are the genetic Gallic roots, DNA of hundreds of years prior, the testament are family members bearing traditional French first names. Second, there is a young woman learning to cook in heyday of French cuisine, Julia still on TV, Wolfgang Puck conjuring up miracles at Ma Maison and my cooking teachers guiding students on cooking tours of France, with visits to Simone Beck in her home, yes, a very young cook could dream. Eventually, I did travel to France, a dream realized to finally taste the recipes I worked to master as a young cook, just beautiful!

Thin Apple Tarts are a simple kitchen feat, delicately, beautifully respecting the sweet nature of the apple, like these Anna Apples from my garden. This little gem recipe has been in my collection since the start and is just about as easy as it gets. This is not the reinventing of classic Tarte au Pommes, just a simple everyday way I have found to make a delightful apple tart that I want to share, a Bijouxs Basics.

Begin with or make (if you are inclined) the best puff pastry dough you can find. Dufour Pastry Kitchens is about the best ready-made puff pastry I can find and of course Pepperidge Farms puff pastry sheets are in most supermarkets. After rolling the dough as thin as possible and cutting into small rounds, the very thin apple slices are places around the dough in a circular pattern, topped with sugar, dotted with butter and sent off to bake in a hot oven for about 10 minutes, that’s it – hardly a recipe, but it produces a great little tart all the same.

A caveat, you may notice a bit of the butter/sugar run off the tarts and blacken on the baking sheet, as long as the tart crust themselves don’t’ burn you are OK, edges of crispy brown caramelized sugar crust on the bottoms of the tarts are divine.

Cooks always keep dreaming in French and along the way may bake up Thin Apple Tarts, more little jewels from my kitchen to yours.

As always, enjoy. B