Tag Archives: Galette

Savoury Apple Galette with Caramelized Shallots and Brown Butter Pastry Crust

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I still had a few of these beautiful Lucy Rose apples in the fridge after creating this Kale and Apple Salad so I decided to bake a savoury apple galette this week. I paired the apples with caramelized shallots and Gruyere and Fontina cheese. This galette is in the running for the best thing I’ve baked this year. Honeycrisp apples are a perfect substitute if you can’t find Lucy Rose apples. They are elusive. It took me 5 years to find them in Ottawa.

I’ve really been into baking with brown butter lately, so I made a brown butter pastry crust, using a fantastic recipe from King Arthur baking. Brown butter is the secret sauce of baked goods. It amplifies all the flavours. It adds depth, richness and a nutty caramel flavour. Browning butter is not difficult, but you do need to allow some time to brown and then chill it, before making the dough.

Butter is composed of butterfat, milk protein and water. When you brown butter, you are essentially toasting the milk protein. As you heat the butter, and it begins to bubble and sputter away, the water evaporates and the hot butterfat begins to cook the milk solids, turning them from creamy yellow to a splendid speckled brown colour and your whole kitchen smells like toasted hazelnuts. It’s insanely gorgeous!

For the savoury part of the galette, I chose shallots. I prefer their more delicate flavour to onions. Caramelizing the shallots takes time and patience. Turn the heat to medium low and don’t rush it. If the shallots start getting too brown before they are tender, splash in about 1/4 cup of water to slow things down. Choose a good melting cheese. Cheddar, gruyere, or fontina are all good choices.

Watch how it all comes together.

Once the galette comes out of the oven, brush the apples with some warmed apricot or apple jelly, for shine and a hit of extra sweetness. The galette is delicious warm or at room temperature. Buttery flaky crust gives way to salty gooey cheese, savoury shallots and sweet apples. It’s the perfect balance of flavour and texture. Brushing the crust with dijon gives a bit of a tang to help balance out the sweetness of the apples.

Click here to print recipe for Savoury Apple Galette with Caramelized Shallots and Brown Butter Pastry.

Leek, Potato and Goat Cheese Galette

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While leek and potatoes are a classic pairing for soup, they also work brilliantly together in a galette. Tangy and creamy goat cheese takes this galette to a new level of yumminess.

The dough for this galette comes together in about one minute in the food processor. It’s a very versatile recipe that can be used for both sweet and savoury galettes. I like to make the dough ahead of time, roll it out and freeze it. That way, I can make a galette any time I have a craving.

There are 2 unusual ingredients in the dough. The first is a bit of sour cream. Sour cream helps the texture of the dough stay tender and adds to the flakiness. It also adds a nice tang to the flavour. The second unusual ingredient oil cornmeal. It contributes a subtle crunch to the dough and makes this dough a dream to roll out.

Watch this galette come together:

Tips for success:

  • Don’t over mix the dough. Stop the food processor just before the dough rolls into a ball.
  • Make sure your butter is very cold and the water is ice cold.
  • The potatoes need to be sliced thinly and par cooked in the microwave for about 4 minutes before layering onto the galette. Raw potatoes will not cook thoroughly in the galette.
  • Bake in lower third of the oven. You want the bottom crust to get nice and brown. Cover top of galette with a bit of foil after 30-35 minutes of baking if the top is getting too brown.
  • Add a it more gruyere and goat cheese to the top of the galette for the last 5 minutes of baking time.
  • Garnish with fresh dill for an extra pop of colour and flavour.
  • This can be served hot, warm or even at room temperature. Leftovers the next day can be heated up in a 350°F oven for 5 minutes.

Here are a few more galette ideas for inspiration. Tomato Gruyere Galette, Winter Squash and Kale Rye Galette, Ombre Apple-Honey Galette, Ombre Tomato Galette with Everything Seasoning, Pluot and Thyme Galette, Apple Galette with Pecan Cheddar Crust, Plum and Cherry Galette with Pistachio Crust, Heirloom Tomato Galette and a Family Reunion, Spring Leek Galette, Wild Mushroom and Leek Galette, and Asparagus Ricotta Galette

Click here to print recipe for Leek, Potato and Goat Cheese Galette.

Tomato Gruyere Galette

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The war on summer needs to stop. I’m looking at you pumpkin spice lovers. Stop flooding my Instagram feed with #PSL. You know, fall does not officially start until September 22. I don’t understand why some people feel the need to rush headlong into fall.

Early September is the time to be gorging on tomatoes and corn.

I refuse to be rushed into the new season. I’m one of those people that continue going sockless well into November. I have been known to slip into my winter boots, barefoot. To be fair, they are fur lined (well fake fur). To be honest, I have trouble with transitions. I always have. So I am here today to prolong your summer as long as possible with a glorious tomato galette. A galette, for the uninitiated, is French for lazy-ass tart 😉. It is essentially a free-form pie. No tart or pie pan needed.

The problem with many pie or tart doughs is toughness. When flour and water are mixed together, water molecules hydrate the gluten-forming proteins in the flour and too much gluten formation can lead to a tough crust. But, when we add fat into the mix, the flour protein molecules become coated with that fat. They provide a barrier that keeps the water molecules away from the protein molecules. Sort of like when you apply frizz-fighting cream into your hair. It coats the hair strands and when dried, protects your hair from moisture in the air.

My galette dough boasts two types of fat, butter and sour cream, leading to a very tender and flaky AF crust. The dough for this galette is so simple to make. It comes together in the food processor in about less than 30 seconds. It is extremely versatile and can be used for both sweet and savoury galettes. The dough freezes beautifully. I usually make extra, roll it out and tuck it into the freezer for when I need a galette fix fast.

The dough is spread with a bit of Dijon mustard for tang and then covered with nutty Gruyere and sliced tomatoes. I found some gorgeous heirloom tomatoes at the supermarket, but any local tomato will be delicious. Finish with drizzle of honey, a sprinkle of thyme and a generous shower of salt. Add fresh basil after baking. Galettes need to a hot oven to brown up that bottom crust. It’s perfect hot, warm or even at room temperature.

Click here to print recipe for Tomato and Gruyere Galette.

Winter Squash and Kale Rye Galette

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January blog posts tend to be full of lofty resolutions and unrealistic goals about how to live a better life. I promise you, this is not one of those posts. I admit that I have have been guilty of exactly this, every January for the past 8 years. Check out my January healthy eating blog posts, if you like (2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, and 2014 ).

This year, I just can’t seem to get my ass in gear. I’m feeling particularly unmotivated and blah. I feel like this guy. Can’t get off the couch to stop bingeing on Bonus Family and Working Moms on Netflix. Very addictive. I know I’m not alone. Almost every single person I have spoken to in the past 2 weeks is feeling this way. I’m here to give you permission to forgo goal setting this year. Treat yourself kindly and ease back in at a pace that makes you feel comfortable.

I eased back in gently by choosing a galette for my first January post. Made with butter and cheese! I am a big believer in small steps. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

We’re taking baby steps here with this galette. I incorporated some whole grains into the crust with the addition of rye flour. I snuck in a layer of Gruyere and ricotta cheese between the kale and the butternut squash. It’s all about moderation.

This rye crust could go sweet or savoury. It is flaky AF. I learned how to make it from Kim Boyce in her book, “Good to the Grain”. If you’re interested in incorporating more whole grains into your baking, this is a fantastic resource. I love the lyrical way she describes this dough.

“The method for making this dough is similar to that for a rough puff pastry, a method I learned while working with Sherry Yard at Spago. It calls for letting a rough dough, made from chunks of butter and moist clumps of flour, rest in the refrigerator to give the gluten time to relax and the flour time to absorb the water. After an hour, the dough is rolled and folded a few times to create long “laminated” layers of butter throughout the dough, which give it its flakiness.”

Feel free to enjoy with a small glass of wine, if you are so inclined. Tell them saltandserenity told you to be kind to yourself!

Click here to print recipe for Squash-and-Kale-Rustic-Rye-GaletteDownload

Pluot and Thyme Galette

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Do you guys know about pluots? They are a hybrid between Japanese plums and apricots. Unlike plums, which can sometimes be tinged with bitterness, pluots are brimming with sweetness. They come in a variety of hues, ranging from purple to red to green. Some varieties are speckled, like a dinosaur egg. Black plums would be a good substitute if you can’t find pluots.

Pie is not really my thing. But I adore galettes. They are essentially a free-form pie and their casual messiness really appeals to me. They come together so quickly. I like to make a few recipes of galette dough at a time. I roll them out into 13 inch circles, wrap them in plastic wrap and stick them in the freezer. I use them for sweet and savoury galettes all summer long.

Any red jam would work here. I used strawberry rhubarb, but raspberry, strawberry or even fig jam would be delicious.

The addition of fresh thyme really complements the sweet pluots. The tiny leaves of a few sprigs brings out the floral note of the pluots.

A scoop of vanilla ice cream or a dollop of whipped cream would not be unwelcome.

Click here to print recipe for Pluot-and-Thyme-GaletteDownload

Apple Galette with Pecan Cheddar Crust

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Think of a galette as the pie’s younger, free-spirited cousin. Pie, is by definition, baked and served in a sloped sided dish. Galettes are totally freeform, no pan, fancy adornments or crimping necessary. Think of a pie as the undergarment equivalent of wearing Spanx. The pie plate holds everything in. Galettes are infinitely more comfortable and easier to make!

The goal of both pies and galettes is a flaky crust. I experimented with adding pistachios to my galette crust this summer. This time I added pecans and cheddar and the results were outstanding. The nuts add a beautiful colour and flavour to the crust and the cheese adds additional fat which leads to extreme flakiness- a good thing in a galette, not so good if you’re human.

In developing this recipe, I made quite a few galettes to get things perfect. The leftovers were sliced, wrapped and frozen for my husband’s nighttime snack habit. I was shocked at how crispy and flaky the crust stayed, even without reheating.

In keeping with our carefree vibe, I left the apples unpeeled. You want to use a smaller apple for this galette. I found some small organic Honeycrisp apples. Pink Lady, Fuji and Granny Smith would also be good choices.



In the video, I used a plate to cut a perfect circle, because I’m not as laid back as I wish I were! Feel free to leave the edges irregular if that’s more your style.

Click here to print recipe for Apple Galette with Pecan Cheddar CrustDownload

Heirloom Tomato Galette and a Family Reunion

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This past weekend we hosted our Triennial (that’s once every three years) family reunion at our cottage, Our first one was 18 years ago, in 2000. This summer we topped out at 43 guests. A tent and more than a few blow up mattresses were involved. Luckily the weather cooperated.

For lunch on Friday, I made a bunch of these galettes. Taking advantage of glorious summer heirloom tomatoes and corn, I added some dijon mustard and Gruyere cheese to amp up the flavour.

In my mind, a galette is the boho-chic French cousin of the tart. Free form and just a little rough around the edges, she is way more fun than a tart.

No need to use a tart pan, just roll out the dough into the approximation of a circle or oval. Once the toppings are in place, gently pleat the sides to form a border.

The dough I use for this galette is a bit unusual in that it contains sour cream as well as butter. The sour cream contributes to a super-flaky crust, almost reminiscent of puff pastry, but without all the work. It rolls out like a dream, no cracking.

The video below demonstrates how to make the dough and assemble the galette. I like to make a few recipes of the dough at a time and then just freeze the rolled out pastry. That way, I can bake a galette whenever the mood strikes or hordes of guests descend upon me.

We hired an amazing caterer so that no one had to spend the entire time in the kitchen. Aside from the galettes, my daughter and I baked over 375 “Bubbe Cookies  (poppy seed cookies created by my grandmother, who we called Bubbe) and crafted a Bubbe cookie wreath to welcome everyone.


We introduced our newest cousin to Bubbe Cookies. She’s a fan!
In past years, we crammed the days full of games and activities. 2012 featured “The Amazing Race- Wedding Edition, in honour of my brother’s upcoming nuptials. Under the guise of helping the betrothed couple prepare for the wedding we were  divided into teams and went off on a car rally-treasure hunt to the lovely town of Perth, Ontario.
2015 featured a donut eating contest, where the donuts were dangling from a string, as well as another “Amazing Race” car rally, this time to the booming town of Smiths Falls, Ontario. This year, it was a bit more low key, with more time chilling, and just a bit of drinking. Now that all the little cousins, nieces and nephews have reached the age of majority, everyone indulged in margaritas on Friday night and Cherry Lemon Gin and Tonic on Saturday night.



Being surrounded with loved ones, watching the sun set and eating great food…We are blessed.

Click here to print recipe for Heirloom Tomato, Corn and Gruyere Galette.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This tart was created because I had a big bowl of wild mushrooms languishing in my fridge from a photo shoot last week. The mushroom photo below was my homework for the Composition Essentials Course I am taking from the very talented Australian food photographer, Rachel Korinek. Not only does she take gorgeous food shots, but she is an extremely skilled teacher.One of our assignments was to look at our past photos and find gaps, areas we had not explored from certain compositional viewpoints. In reviewing my pictures, I noticed that I shoot really tight, and don’t leave much breathing room. I guess it’s the photographic equivalent of close talkers.

Negative space is naturally calming. It helps to emphasize your subject and provides your image with balance. The second compositional tool I incorporated into my mushroom photo was advanced lines. I used a gently curving arabesque, which takes your eye on a journey from the top to the bottom of the frame.

I wanted to make something springlike, because I’m tired of roasted veggies and hearty soups. Leeks are one of the first signs of spring to appear on the market shelves, and their sweet mellow flavour is a perfect complement to earthy mushrooms. Plus, they don’t make me cry, like onions do, when I slice them.

This galette dough is one of my favourite pastry recipes. I learned how to make it in my very first kitchen job almost 30 years ago. It uses butter and sour cream and it rolls out like a dream. No cracking or shrinking.

Ricotta, gruyere and parmesean cheese are combined to create a base before the mushrooms and leeks are added. Leave a border and then gently pleat the dough to encase the filling.

A drizzle of olive oil before baking.

A generous zesting of lemon after baking.

Click here to print recipe for Mushroom Leek Galette.

 

Asparagus Ricotta Galette

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BakedOnce local asparagus shows up, you know that flip flops and a chilled glass of rosé can’t be too far behind. This tart is a splendid way to showcase asparagus, Post-Asparagus Stinky-Urine Disorder, be damned.one sliceMild, milky ricotta is the ideal partner for asparagus. They complement each other perfectly. Ricotta can be a bit bland, so I added  lemon zest, lemon juice and red pepper flakes to ramp up the flavour. Some grated Gruyere cheese and a beaten egg add some heft to the filling.

For the dough, I decided to use Kim Boyce’s Rustic Rye Dough, from her book Good to the Grain. The hearty rye dough stands up quite well against asparagus’ strong flavour.

This dough takes a bit of time and needs several hours to chill. If you don’t have the time or the inclination, I think that this tart would still be very delicious using my go-to simple Galette Dough.making rye dough 1Rye flour, all purpose flour sugar and salt are sifted. Cold butter is worked in with your hands. Ice water and cider vinegar bring it all together.making rye dough 2Once the dough comes together, let it rest in the fridge for about an hour, then roll it into a rectangle, and fold the rectangle into thirds, like a letter. This is similar to the process of making puff pastry. The dough gets rolled and folded two more times and is then chilled for an additional hour. You can make the dough and the filling components a day ahead and then just assemble and bake before you are ready to eat. making rye dough 3making rye dough 4I decided to roll the dough into a rectangular shaped tart, but feel free to to roll it into a circle. I have a strong aesthetic sense and I prefer the linear way the asparagus line up in a rectangular tart.

To punch up the flavour profile even more, I spread the tart with a pistachio pesto (recipe from Anna Jones’ A Modern Way to Cook.)  Whole grain dijon mustard or a jarred basil pesto would  be good substitutes.Spreading pistachio pestoSpreading ricotta fillingThe border of the tart just gets folded over the filling. No need to be too precise or precious about it. It’s supposed to be rustic. galette ready for ovengalette cut upThis would be great as a light lunch or dinner, or cut up into smaller squares and served for aperitivo with a freezing cold glass of Prosecco, on the dock. (I have big plans for this tart!)3 plates

Click here to print recipe for Aspsaragus and Ricotta Galette.

Click here to print recipe for Rustic Rye Dough or here to print recipe for Galette Dough.

galette with a glass of wine

Wild Blueberry and Corn Galette

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A slice with tea 2Galette is French for “Lazy Ass Pie.” No, not really. It actually refers to a free-form tart. Pies are a lot of work. There’s all that stress about making the crust and rolling it out without cracking. Plus, I suck at crimping. But a galette is supposed to be rustic. Rolling the dough into a perfect circle is  not required, in fact, it is frowned upon. (Well, I frown upon perfect circles)

Wild blueberries have arrived and sadly, they’re only here for a few short weeks, so I take advantage of the short season and work very hard at eating my weight in wild blueberries during the month of August. This recipe would certainly work with regular blueberries, but you may need to add a bit more sugar, since wild ones are so much sweeter. You could also use frozen berries. The PC frozen wild blueberries are excellent, as are Trader Joe’s brand.

OK, let’s make a lazy ass pie galette. Start with the filling. Mix blueberries, tapioca flour (also called tapioca starch), sugar and lemon juice. Filling ingredientsNext we tackle the topping. This corn crisp topping was the genius idea of Bon Appetit Magazine. I saw it in their July 2016 issue, and I knew I had to try it. Such a fun idea to combine blueberry and corn in a dessert. Start with a traditional crisp topping of flour, sugar and butter. Add a touch of cornmeal for added crunch. corn topping_2Then cut in fresh corn kernels. Topping done. cutting corn off the cobThe dough comes together very quickly in the food processor. No need to chill it. Just roll it out right away between 2 sheets of parchment paper, to avoid any fuss. rolling dough between sheets of parchmentTime to assemble.

I made a dairy free version of the galette last weekend for some friends. I used chilled coconut oil in both the dough and the topping and it was fantastic. The coconut oil was only detected (and rejected) by one friend, but I suspect he’s a super taster. Blueberry Corn Galette 2

Click here to print recipe for Wild Blueberry and Corn Galette.

slice of galette

 

 

 

Rye Galette

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When I started this blog over two years ago, I never imagined that it would be read by college and university students. Yet, somehow, I seem to have garnered a following among the 20 something crowd. It started with the daughters of my friends. One young woman, my god-daughter, has set my blog as her home page and was worried about me when I went 10 days without blogging.  She actually called her mom to ask if everything was ok with me . How sweet is that?

Then it grew to include my daughter’s friends. She was quite proud of her mom and told her friends about my blog. I am sure they checked it out, just to be polite, because they are such nice young women!

However, I think they kept returning to the blog because they loved to read stories about my daughter and then tease and embarrass her. This was when they were in high school. Over the past 2 years they have moved onto university and have just recently moved out of residence and into their own apartments. Now they are interested in cooking, so they read the blog for recipes. And they have told their friends about it. So a big shout out to all my girls at McGill, Queens, Emerson and Ryerson!

My daughter’s best friend, spent many hours at our home when they were in high school. She loved eating at our house, especially when I made peanut butter bark, as her brother has a peanut allergy, so she couldn’t have it at home. Once she moved into her own apartment, she began asking me for recipes. She has turned out to be a wonderful cook (one minor mishap with vegetarian chili – but we won’t talk about that). She became obsessed with my galettes (free form tarts) and in May she made a Roasted Tomato and Gruyère Galette for her mom for Mother’s day and told me it was one of her proudest moments! It makes me so happy to see the next generation taking an interest in cooking and baking.

My sons, by the way, do not tell anyone their mother is a blogger. The oldest, probably for fear that his friends will read something humiliating about him, and the youngest because he can’t imagine his mother has time for anything but him!

Flushed with success at my recent venture into whole grains baking, I decided to try Kim Boyce’s Rustic Rye Dough and create a galette with that. In her book, “Good to the Grain”, Kim gives a lyrical description of this dough.

“The method for making this dough is similar to that for a rough puff pastry, a method I learned while working with Sherry Yard at Spago. It calls for letting a rough dough, made from chunks of butter and moist clumps of flour, rest in the refrigerator to give the gluten time to relax and the flour time to absorb the water. After an hour, the dough is rolled and folded a few times to create long “laminated” layers of butter throughout the dough, which give it its flakiness.”

Of course I waited to make the galette until my daughter’s galette obsessed friend was coming for a visit to the cottage. I filled the tart with spinach, corn, Asiago and provolone cheese and sliced tomatoes. The nutty flavour of the rye dough was perfect with that filling. Now of course my daughter’s friend wants to know how to make this, so here is a step by step tutorial, with video, to help her on her way.

Click here to print the recipe for Rustic Rye Dough .

Click here to print recipe for Asiago, Spinach, Corn and Tomato Galette