Peaches and cream Breton tart

Oooh my, soooo good! My favorite Breton dough, a thin layer of peach jam, fresh Michigan peaches and an easy custard all baked up into a golden buttery treat. What more could you want on a summer August day?

August and fresh peaches go hand and hand for me. Growing up, my early August birthday dessert choice was most often pound cake with fresh peaches and ice cream. Oh those memories.

Being in a tart mood as I planned some assorted treats for folks down the street, I knew a Breton dough base would be just the thing. While I typically make individual portions for such occasions, my brain asked - how about slices for a change? Two rectangle tart forms coming right up.

I’ve written several times about the beauty of using Breton dough for its versatility. Bake it thick and plain to create a gateau Breton, roll it more thinly and bake it topped with jammy fruit and crumble or make simple crisp cookies to go with your afternoon tea.

When making Breton tarts, I lean towards a thicker base crust to put the texture somewhere between cookie and cake. Thicker more cake-y, thinner more crisp.

As you see below, the straight sided form is slightly wider so I gauged my dough quantity to give me a thickness of about 3/8”, ending up with 400 g of dough for the slighter smaller fluted form and 475 g for the straight sided one. Butter the forms (it helps so much with removal later - trust me).

Place the dough between plastic wrap and roll or press it into its rough shape . . . . .

then transfer it into the form, pressing it evenly and also building up an edge to provide a dam for the upcoming custard. Please note - I left the bottom out of the fluted form - I’ll come back to that later.

Once both forms are “doughed” up, place plastic wrap directly on the dough surface to cover and chill until ready for assembly. The lining step is one you can complete even a couple of days ahead if desired. While the chilling step isn’t absolutely essential, I find that dough always bakes a bit better when it’s cold going into a hot oven.

Heat the oven to 350ºF. Spread a thin layer of peach jam over the dough and bake about 20 minutes to set the dough. You should see the dough risen up and starting to brown a bit.

A quick jam note - every year I contemplate a jump onto the jam making band wagon, yet thus far that process hasn’t finagled its way into my summer repertoire. There are some wonderful jams to be found on well stocked supermarket shelves. I lean toward French made brands like St. Dalfour and Bonne Maman which both offer an interesting line up of flavors.

Before baking

The par-baking gives me just the amount of time I need to prep my fruit and make my easy custard.

Par-baked

For the custard: in a medium bowl whisk together 80 g cane sugar, 160 ml heavy cream, 2 large eggs, 1.5 tablespoons all purpose flour, 25 g almond flour, 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander, a few grates of fresh nutmeg and a splash of vanilla extract. You can leave out the spices if you prefer and, instead of vanilla, add 1/2 tablespoon of peach brandy or your favorite almond liqueur.

The beauty of this custard filling is not only its ease of preparation but you can whip it up earlier in the day and hold it in the fridge - when ready, give it a quick re-whisk to bring it all back together.

Two ripe peaches for each tart were perfect - peel, slice and line them up something like this.

Carefully pour the custard over the peaches as far up to the edges as you can without overflowing (whoops - a little bit there on the left). There will most likely be a bit of custard left.

Bake for 10-15 minutes to start setting the custard and then you should be able to add the remainder, drizzling it over the top. Don’t worry it you don’t use quite all of it.

Bake for an additional 20-30 minutes until the custard is set, a bit puffy and nicely golden.

Looking pretty good!

Cool for 5-10 minutes then gently loosen the edges using a paring knife or offset spatula to reduce the stick factor from any stray custard. As noted on the left above, Breton dough can sometimes sneak out under the edges of open tart forms during baking - just trim away any edge bits.

Cool an additional 30 minutes or so. The straight sided open form should lift off pretty easily. With a removable bottom fluted form, double check that the curvy edges are free before pushing the bottom up to lift it out of the form. Let cool to room temperature.

NOTE: you may have noticed I baked my fluted tart WITHOUT the removable bottom. I find the crust browns more thoroughly that way. For ease of release, I pop it into the freezer for 20-30 minutes to finish cooling and firm it up. It’s much less fragile that way and is easier to remove from the form.

This tart keeps in the fridge a couple of days at least. Slice into rectangles and top with candied almonds for serving.

For the almonds: oven at 350ºF; parchment lined sheet pan; place 1/2 cup sliced almonds in a medium saucepan along with 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup water and 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt; bring to a boil over medium heat and cook 1 minute; strain (discard the liquid) and spread the nuts on the prepared sheet pan; bake ~15 minutes, stirring half way through, until nicely browned; let cool. Keep in a covered container at room temperature and enjoy as a garnish on whatever you fancy!

Let’s just say that all of those who tasted these delectable slices (including Steve, the tasting maestro!) were very happy indeed. I love that.

Summer’s waning, autumn’s coming. Meanwhile please take care of yourselves and those you love.

Lovely color at nearby Meijer Gardens

Blueberry hazelnut tarte Bretonne

Petite version

I’ve extolled the virtues of sablé Breton on a number of occasions over the years and simply must return to it now and again. The dough is versatile and one that I can make ahead and keep handy in the freezer for a couple of months. As we ease into the late spring and summer seasons, a Breton dough base is perfect either baked with fruit or jam or baked au naturel and topped with fresh fruits and luscious creams. Mmmmm . . . I can just taste them now. Fulton Farmers Market here I come!

Just one of the beauties of this dough is it’s made with egg yolks so . . . . . . When I need to amass egg whites for some of my faves like financier, dacquoise or Swiss meringue buttercream, Breton dough comes to the rescue. Separate the eggs, yolks go into the dough and whites (which can sit in the fridge for a week or so and can also be frozen) are on hand for whatever. I love that.

As an aside, a few other basics that offer me the same egg white saving opportunities are the classic custard sauce/ice cream base crème anglaise or the familiar crème pâtissiére, crème brulée and pots de crème. Of course it’s generally best to make these egg and dairy based goodies within a couple of days of enjoying them, so some planning ahead is important. But they’ll all give you plenty of whites to add to your stash.

I do digress. On to la tarte Bretonne!

The dough comes together easily - one plan ahead note is the butter should be soft. Let it sit out an hour or so, mise out the rest of the ingredients and you’re ready to go. Once mixed you can either wrap in plastic and chill for later or you can shape a rough circle and simply press it into a buttered ring or mold. NOTE: I love baking this dough in silicone flexi-molds which don’t have to be buttered. Yay - one less step!

Here I sub in hazelnut flour for the almond but you can do the same with pretty much any ground nut. Using a buttered 220 mm / 9” tart ring, I guestimated about 360 g of dough to press in the bottom and build up the sides. It’s up to you to experiment a bit, depending on how thin or thick you want your finished dough to be. Thicker than a typical tarte crust is my preference here. You can use even more dough (up it to 400 or 425 g) for a base that’s a delicious, buttery cross between tarte and cake. Yum.

Just for comparison sake, if I’m making a standard tarte with let’s say pâte sucrée, a good rule of thumb is to take the diameter of your ring (e.g. 220 mm), add 30 g to that number and that gives you a decent estimate for the amount of dough for that size ring - 250 g. It works pretty well with inches/ounces too - 9” tart uses about 9 ounces of dough.

Once the dough is pressed into the ring, you can cover and refrigerate it for a few hours or overnight if you’re not quite ready to proceed.

I made a quick hazelnut crumble with 50 g sugar and 75 g whole wheat pastry flour (all purpose is fine too) mixed in a medium bowl; sand in 60 g of cool, cubed butter to coarse crumbs and add 30 g of toasted and chopped hazelnuts. It yields plenty for this type of project and you can freeze any leftover for next time.

My store bought blueberry jam is Bonne Maman, but I also like St. Dalfour, both of which have some great flavor options.

Heat the oven to 350ºF.

Create a layer of fresh blueberries mixed with a few spoonfuls of jam (eyeball it) over the dough. No fancy fillings here folks!

Top it with a decent layer of crumble.

Bake about 25-30 minutes until the edges and crumble are nicely browned and the jam/berries look bubbly and set. Reduce oven to 325ºF if you feel your edges are browning too quickly. It’s up to you to keep on eye on things!

I made this baby for Easter dessert, served with homemade raspberry ice cream. The end result was a nutty, chewy, buttery, jammy, fruity and delicious treat which paired so beautifully with the creamy raspberry.

Truth be told, I prefer small individual desserts to larger, sliceable versions. I made a petite version ahead of time as a test, and it worked so well with a rustic scoop of ice cream right on top. Steve and I enjoyed our taste test while the tartelette was fresh and still a tad warm. Oh my.

There are so many ways to create your own tarte Bretonne. Trust me, you won’t regret it!

Meanwhile spring keeps springing with flowers popping, sightings of turtles on logs, herons flying overhead, red wing blackbirds with their shrill call, garter snakes on the path and spring peepers singing to us all.

Enjoy the season and stay safe.