Buckwheat Five-Spice Free-Form Apple Tart

Several years ago I received a copy of Deborah Madison’s cookbook, Vegetable Literacy, for my birthday. It never occurred to me that a cookbook about vegetables would include a recipe for an apple tart. But Deborah snuck it into the chapter on buckwheat since it calls for buckwheat flour in the crust. It was a very thin chapter – only three recipes – so I guess she was willing to relax her standards a bit.

I’ve made a lot of free-form tarts, but what attracted me to this recipe was the fact that the apples are caramelized before baking which ensures that they will be cooked through and that it uses Chinese five-spice.  I have two jars of it in my spice drawer, and have had little hope of reducing them down to a single jar in my lifetime. So HOORAY, I just used up 1½ teaspoons.

Ingredients:

The Dough

  • 1 cup all-purpose flour or white whole wheat flour

  • ½ cup buckwheat flour

  • ½ tsp sea salt

  • 1 heaping tsp five-spice powder*

  • 2 Tbs granulated or brown sugar

  • ½ cup butter, cold and cut into small pieces

  • 1 egg yolk

  • ½ tsp apple cider vinegar

  • 2 Tbs ice water, plus more if needed

  • 1 tsp vanilla extract

The Filling

  • 1 Tbs butter

  • 8-10 apples – cored, quartered and cut into ½” wide slices

  • 1 Tbs granulated sugar mixed with ½ tsp five-spice powder

Topping

  • 1 Tbs butter melted

  • Sour cream, creme fraiche, yogurt or ice cream

Directions:

Dough

  1. Place the flours, salt, spice, and sugar in the bowl of a food processor, and pulse to blend.

  2. Scatter the butter pieces over the top of the flour, and pulse until the mixture forms small pebbles of butter.

  3. In a small bowl whisk together the egg yolk with the vanilla, vinegar and 2 TBS ice water.

  4. Dribble the liquid into the flour a little at a time. Process until the dough comes together. You can add more ice water one tsp at a time if the dough is too dry.

  5. Gather the dough into a ball.  Flatten into a disc, wrap in wax paper, and refrigerate until needed.

Filling

  1. To caramelize the apples, melt the butter in a skillet over high heat.  When the butter foams, add the apple slices. Sprinkle them with the sugar mixture.  Initially the apples will give up some juice, but once this evaporates, they will begin to brown. Cook, tossing the apples frequently until they are golden and caramelized - about 10-15 minutes.

Assembly

  1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.  Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.

  2. Remove the dough from the refrigerator. Flour your work surface and rolling pin. Roll out the dough into a large circle or oval, and move it to the baking sheet. (Roll it on the wax paper it was wrapped in to make it easy to transfer it to the baking sheet.)

  3. Heap the apples in the center of the dough leaving 2”of dough uncovered around the outside edge.

  4. Fold the edge of the dough up over the apples, pleating the dough as you go. Most of the apples will be uncovered.

  5. Brush the dough with melted butter. Pour any extra butter over the apples in the center.

  6. Bake about 30 minutes until the crust is browned and crisp.  If you are not serving it right away, cover it and reheat before serving.

  7. Serve with sour cream, creme fraiche, yogurt or ice cream.