Do you like pie or do you prefer sweet treats like tarts or pastries? If you asked me, I would hands down prefer a French apple tart or a classic puff pastry over pie or cake. How can you resist all those crisp, buttery flakes melting in your mouth?
How Puff Pastry Dough Works
Now let’s talk about those light layers of buttery perfection for a minute. Puff pastry dough, or Pâte Feuilletée, as it’s known in France, consists of thin, alternating layers of pastry and butter. When baked, the water in the dough and the butter turns into steam. The steam then expands the delicate dough layers making them puff. And as we know from science, steam takes up more space than liquid water, so pastry dough expands up to 8 times its original height.
Our baked apple tart recipe showcases a light and crispy pastry topped with apples, butter, sugar and a homemade Grand Marnier drizzle. Serve it as an after dinner treat or at brunch with Champagne. I promise it pairs well with sparkling wine. I’ve tested it several times!
What You’ll Need
- Baking pans
- Parchment paper
- Cutting board
- Pairing knife
- Small bowl
For the baked apple delight pastry dough you can make it one of two ways. The first way will simplify your life because all of the hard work is done for you. Buy a puff pastry dough that can be divided into squares. If your dough is frozen, it will need to thaw before you begin. Also make sure you line your baking sheets with parchment paper and space your puff pastry squares evenly.
Our Pastry Dough Recommendation
For pastry dough, Dufour Pastry Kitchens tops our list as they use simple, fresh ingredients such as butter, flour, water, salt and lemon juice. They consistently produce superior puff pastries nation-wide and receive industry accolades and awards. Did I mention they are women-owned?
Instructions
Select apples you like to eat raw. I prefer Honeycrisp apples so that’s what I used for this baked apple delight. Peel and thinly slice 2-3 apples.
With your puff pastry squares on the parchment paper place your peeled apple slices on top of the chilled dough. We used 3-4 thin apple slices per square. Now sprinkle about a 1/4-1/2 teaspoon of sugar over each square and add 3 cubes of butter. Each cube of butter is about 1/2 an inch.
Bake your apple tarts in the oven for 15 minutes at 375 degrees F.
Brush or drizzle your baked apple delights with your Grand Marnier glaze and serve at room temperature.
With the second method you make the pastry dough from scratch. While it’s time-consuming to prepare your French apple tart dough, every crispy bite will be worth it!
For more sweet treats, check out our cream puff recipe or our simple white chocolate mousse with fresh berries.
For a savory puff pastry snack try our gruyere, prosciutto, and spinach pinwheel.