In my opinion, a galette is an ideal pie: easy, because you don’t have to work super neatly (let’s call it rustic!), with a perfect ratio of sweet fruit filling and crispy crust. You can make it with pretty much every available fruit – thus perfect throughout the year – and the dough can also be easily altered.
I recently bought the incredibly gorgeous ‘Sweeter of the vine’ cookbook from Yossi Arefi and I fell in love with the pretty pictures, variety of recipes, lovely little stories in between and the precise recipes. In this book, I found a recipe for an apricot and berry galette and the recipe for little rhubarb galettes. I decided to combine those two and make a new creation. Definitely one I’ll be making more often!
The base of these galettes is Yossy’s ‘all butter pie crust’: an easy dough with butter, that makes for a flaky, firm and not too sweet crust with the perfect amount of crunch. I chose the spelt variation, where you substitute half of the wheat flour for spelt flour. The nutty flavor makes for a lovely robust pie, but you could just use all wheat flour instead.
I bought a huge amount of Reine Victoria plums on the farmers market, with their pretty purple-red skins and juicy yellow flesh. I decided to give them a little extra by adding some lavender. Just a pinch gives this galette a flowery, fresh accent. Make sure to use organic lavender or replace this ingredient with vanilla bean or cinnamon. Both really nice as well.
This galette is best when you serve it lukewarm, preferably with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, crème fraîche or really good creamy Greek yogurt.
With the amounts in this recipe, you can make one big or two smaller galettes. Or you could make about 6 individual ones, like you see in the pictures. The baking time of the little galettes is probably a bit shorter and maybe you need to cover them with aluminum foil for the last minutes of baking, to prevent them from burning.
INGREDIENTS
makes 1 large, 2 small or ca. 6 mini galettes
for the dough:
1 1/3 cups (170g) all purpose flour and/or spelt flour (1:1 ratio)
½ tsp salt
½ cup plus 1 tablespoon (125g) very cold unsalted butter
½ tbsp apple cider vinegar
4 tbsp (60 ml) ice water
for the filling:
about 10 plums, pitted and halved*
4 tbsp honey
½ tbsp dried lavender
optional: 2 tbsp almond flour
1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp sugar**
extra: baking sheet, lined with parchment paper + rolling pin
*Making little galettes? Cut the halved plums into slices.
** coconut blossom sugar or caster sugar gives a lovely caramel taste
DIRECTIONS
Begin with the dough. Whisk the flour and salt together in a large bowl, cut the butter into 1⁄2-inch cubes, and add the apple cider vinegar to the ice water.
Working quickly, add the butter to the flour and toss to coat. Then use your fingers or the palms of your hands to press each cube of butter into a flat sheet. Keep tossing the butter in the flour as you go to ensure that each butter piece is coated with flour. The idea is to create flat, thin shards of butter. If at any time the butter seems warm or soft, briefly refrigerate the bowl.
Sprinkle about 3 tablespoons of the icy cold vinegar-water mixture over the flour mixture. Use a gentle hand to stir the water into the flour until just combined. If the dough seems dry, add more cold water. You have added enough water when you can pick up a handful of the dough and easily squeeze it together without it falling apart.
Press the dough together, form into a disk and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill the dough for at least 2 hours before using, but preferably overnight.
Preheat the oven to 400F (200C). Mix the plums with the honey and lavender.
On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into one or several circles, just under 1/4-inch (1/2cm) thick. Transfer the dough to the prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle over the almond meal if you like. This makes the bottom extra crispy, because the ground almonds will take some of the fruit juices in.
Top the dough with the plums, but leave a border around the edges. Fold these edges of the pastry over the fruit and press gently to seal the folds. Chill the formed tart in the fridge until the dough is firm.
Gentle brush the edges with the egg wash and sprinkle with sugar. Bake until the pastry is deep golden brown, 30-40 minutes. Cover if the galettes burn before this time. Let cool slightly before serving.
