Plum & pistachio frangipane tart
Think of this as a deep-dish galette. It’s not completely free-form, but baking it in a pan allows you to pack in more filling. A hearty layer of creamy pistachio frangipane holds the weight of ripe, juicy plums, all wrapped in a flaky pie crust. My favourite part of making this is layering the plums, each one placed intentionally, overlapping the next. There’s something really beautiful about a tart or pie just before it goes into the oven, so take a moment to admire the gentle folds of pastry and jewels of demerara sugar.
This recipe is extracted from ‘A Good Day to Bake’ by Benjamina Ebuehi
Ingredients
Serves 10
For the pastry
For the fillling
For the frangipane
Method
Step 1
To make the pastry, add the flour, sugar, salt and butter to a large bowl. Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips to get a coarse mixture with some chunks of butter still visible. You don’t want it to be fine and even. Add the water a tablespoon at a time and stir with a table knife until it begins to clump together. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and give it a very brief, gentle knead to bring it together. Pat the dough into a thick disc, wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
Step 2
Preheat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan/400°F/gas mark 6) and grease a loose-bottomed 20-cm (8-in) baking pan.
Step 3
Once chilled, roll out the pastry to about 5cm (2in) larger than the size of the pan and press it into the pan, letting the extra pastry hang over the edges. Chill while you make the filling.
Step 4
If your plums are on the small side, slice them into quarters, otherwise slice them into eighths. Add them to a bowl with the caster sugar and ground ginger, mix to coat and set aside.
Step 5
To make the frangipane, pulse the pistachios in a food processor until fine or use a sharp knife to chop them as finely as you can. Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla together for 3–5 minutes until pale and creamy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the ground pistachios and almonds and stir in.
Step 6
Spoon the frangipane into the chilled pastry case, smoothing the top. Discard any liquid from the plums and arrange them on top, starting from the outside and working your way in, and letting them overlap a little. Fold the excess pastry over the plums and brush with egg wash. Sprinkle on the demerara sugar.
Step 7
Bake for 20 minutes, then reduce the oven to 180°C (160°C fan/ 350°F/gas mark 4) and bake for a further 35–40 minutes until the pastry is deep brown and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out mostly clean (a bit of plum juice is fine). Let cool in the pan for 20 minutes before removing from the pan to cool completely.
