Who doesn’t like fruit desserts? Obviously the French do, and who could blame them – can you say, ‘tarte tatin’, ‘galette’, and ‘clafoutis’, to name a few? Yes, indeed, and let’s not forget one more: sweet and creamy, say it is so, buttery almond ‘frangipane’ tart.
‘Berry’ interested in yet another baking adventure, this summer beckons a frangipane tart using summer’s best of seasonal fruits. Following Food and Wine Magazine’s take on a raspberry frangipane recipe, I choose to forgo the ruby jewels – this time – and swap them for peaches. Easy to follow, instructions are pretty straightforward. But to my fellow baking enthusiasts, take note: the ingredient list for the shell forgets – perhaps, ‘accidentally’ – to indicate the need for one egg yolk though, to be fair, it does outline this particular ‘necessity’ in the phrased steps. Averting any and all confusion, now you know!
As for the peaches, I suppose I could blanch and peel some fresh stone fruit. Wanting to enjoy the remaining days of summer, however, why bother? Honestly, I use a can of – conveniently sweet – already peeled and halved canned peaches, leaving me to slice and tastefully arrange these beauties in a neat row and spiral floral display. Before embellishing the tart with fruit, here’s a helpful heads up: the rich almond mixture may spill over the shell – and that’s not uncommon – but, frangipane is too good to waste. Clearly wanting to avoid loss of golden almond cream, you can choose to spread the filling over the blind-baked ‘pâte sucrée’ – sugar pastry – first, and then proceed to arrange the fruit. Truth be told, that’s what I did, and I yielded a fully intact tart with barely any spillage of frangipane. So, yes, I did ignore the recipe’s suggested order of fruit then batter process, but it worked for me – sorry not sorry, Food and Wine Magazine!
F.Y.I.: if you also find yourself with an abundance of fruit from the farmer’s market – or love to bake and share, like ‘moi’ – you can definitely double up on the recipe items to make two tarts. In this case, I use twice the amount of wet and dry ingredients in addition to two large tins of canned peaches – one can will suffice per tart – as well as two tart pans. Worth a mention, I used square and round pans with the removable bottoms, but found the round nonstick pan to release the completely baked and cooled pastry more easily than the ‘stickler’ square. Evidently, the baking struggle is real and lesson learned: instructed to do so or not, always line with parchment – done and done!
Content with the overall outcome, this sweet frangipane dessert is visually stunning and tastes equally fine. The buttery pastry slightly crumbles but still manages to hold the delicate custard-like almond and segmented ‘peach body’ center of fruit, pretty well. Successfully made, I’m feeling peachy keen about this recipe. Best part is: the same shell and batter can be used with various fruits to make all sorts of short crust frangipane treats – the possibilities are endless! So, there it is! You can have summer’s best and a portion of your daily dose of essential vitamins, all thanks to ‘tarte frangipane à la pêche’.
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