The Cottage Smallholder


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Orangette’s apricot tart recipe

baked apricot tart ready to seve

This apricot tart is absolutely delicious

A couple of years ago I found a wonderful blog – Orangette. I read her post on bananas and was totally hooked. In fact, I often think about that post. Her writing is superb, it nips you gently and you remember it forever.

A week or so ago a new friend emailed me. She had tried out Orangette’s recipe for apricot tart. Apparently it was dazzling. My friend’s a wonderful writer and the combination of two good writers and one great recipe made me desperate to make this delicacy for our next supper party.

Even though I don’t tend to make desserts, I have a passion for fresh fruit tarts. I haunted Patisserie Valerie in Old Compton Street in the bad old days. Allowing myself just one visit a week, I’d totter away with a carrier bag that filled the vast fridge at work and lasted barely a couple of days.

Shopping with my mother yesterday, I found a pack of fresh apricots in a severely depleted supermarket shelf (The long Bank Holiday weekend means meagre pickings on the Sunday in the UK).
“Don’t buy those. There may be duff ones in the pack!”
She showed me a vast tray of individual apricots just waiting to be selected and transformed into something delicious.

I hesitated, wondering what sort of apricots I needed for the tart. I don’t buy apricots since the apricot brandy disaster a few years ago.

“I have seen people peeling back the top layer to reveal the fruit underneath.”
She gently pulled back the plastic and unveiled some tempting fruit. I selected eight plump specimens, grazing between the layers.

I was quite excited when I made the tart this afternoon. I played with the recipe a bit, making a 50:50 Stork and butter pastry and adding a teaspoonful of Kirsch to the apricots and sugar. Next time it will be all butter pastry for a bit more crumble. This recipe enhanced the flavour of the fruit moving from OK at the preparation stage to zingy and tangy when cooked.

The tart flirted with us all afternoon. Sitting on the side, under a fly proof umbrella, looking so pretty in a glazed apricoty way. It was so quick and easy to make and tasted sublime this evening. Why did I divide the tart equally between the six of us? I could have been nibbling some as I wrote this post.

Thank you, Orangette.
 


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5 Comments

  1. Hello Fiona

    Have I started something? I apologise now for any possible impact on the waist-line! I decided that Orangette had already tweaked the recipe so I didn’t need to. I’m making this again for a party in a couple of weeks, if I made it just for myself I doubt I would have the self-control not to eat it all at once!

  2. Fiona Nevile

    Hi John

    Great to hear from you. That must be tough – meat wise!

    Fred is just doing 2 days at the shop now. There’s a new manager – David. We are working on getting the bacon better by hanging the pork for longer!

    Miss you.

    Hi Pamela

    You are so right about the pastry. The second time that I made it, it worked like a dream.

    Hi Sylvie

    I loved this tart. In fact I am now undertaking a tart making journey. Great for the palate, not so good for the figure!!

  3. What a wonderful looking treat. I know what you mean about supermarket shelves on a Bank Holiday weekend.

  4. Hello Fiona

    I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist playing with this recipe! 100% butter is the way to go on this pastry. I’m not sure how you managed to divide this tart between 6; having dropped one friend off on the way home from the cinema two of us finished off the rest for a late night snack. It is just a flavour explosion in the mouth. By the way, thanks for the link to Orangette.

  5. hi danny and fiona hope you are both well i cannot always get online but always check out your website when i can i have been to malayisa for a while now im back in bangkok and i am going to cambodia next month .living on fish rice and noodles and lots of fresh fruit as the meat is not all that good here your website always makes me feel hungry say hi to fred for me
    john

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