09/05/2020, Cazères (Haute-Garonne)-Loudenvielle (Hautes-Pyrénées)
The
Tour de France arrived in the Pyrenees
mountains, in the region of Bigorre, an area known for its miracles (Lourdes),
its rugby teams (Lourdes again, Tarbes, Bagnères) and its pastries (the spit
cake, brought by Napoleon’s soldiers back from the Grande Armée’s campaigns in
Eastern Europe, the croustade also named pastis). The opportunity for me to add
a dessert to my Tour de France 2020 menu, in particular after a rich cassoulet
yesterday. Both desserts, croustade and spit cake, are both challenging
pastries, at least for a non-baker for me. As the spit cake requires some equipment,
I opted for the croustade, which is by the way not the lightest dessert on
earth as it is, like would like, the Pyrenees version of the Kouign-Amman or of
the Baklava: sugar, butter, Armagnac… with some apples.
The main,
and only, difficulty is to make a supple and elastic enough dough, so that you
can stretch it from a big base-ball sphere to a 8, 10 or 12 square feet sheet
as thin as cigarette paper!!! In hindsight, it was very much easier that I
thought, even for “big fingers” like me, and encourage you to try it if you
never did. Extremely rewarding and definitively a WOW pie!
* During the Tour de France, combining two of my passions, biking and cooking, I will try to present (almost) every day a recipe from ) the route followed by the peloton.
Here is
the detailed recipe, with pictures illustrating each step of the process:
|
Levels of
difficulty |
Cost |
Preparation |
Resting |
Cooking |
|
n
|
$ |
60 minutes |
>4/5 hours |
40 minutes |
|
Ingredients
4 servings
For the dough: §
At least 400 g T55 flour (to adjust depending on the
conditions… and the size of your table, see below) §
25 cl of water §
1 tbsp. of sunflower or other neutral oil §
About 15 cl of sunflower or other neutral oil §
1 egg § Salt For the
filling: §
2 Golden apples §
7 cl of Armagnac* §
120 g of sugar §
100 g of melted butter
§
… a big enough old, but clean, softener-free tablecloth
or bed sheet § … and a hair-dryer! * or Cognac
if you cannot find Armagnac |
Instructions The dough: §
In a bowl, break the egg, add the water, a good
pinch of salt, 1 tablespoon of oil then integrate the flour progressively, stirring with a whisk, then with a wooden spoon
and finally by hand as the dough thickens. §
Knead it by hand during a long time to give it
elasticity, then fold it and beat it repetitively with a rolling pin to give
it suppleness. §
Place the dough in a freezing bag, add 15 cl of oil,
fold the bag and let it rest overnight or at least for 4/5 hours in the
fridge.
The apples: § Cut them into thin slices and drizzle them generously with Armagnac, stir and let macerate overnight or at least for 4/5 hours in the fridge as well. The
assembly: §
At the end of the resting/macerating time, cover a big
enough table (in my case, a rectangular 4’x2’table, adjust the quantity of
dough ingredients if you have a bigger table) with the bed sheet or
tablecloth. Flour it lightly and place the dough in the center of the table. §
Stretch it gradually and very progressively towards
the edges, avoiding to “puncture” it. An important tip consists in regularly lifting
up the dough off the sheet to facilitate the stretching. §
When the whole table is covered, let the dough dry
for 30 minutes to 1 hour depending on temperature and humidity or use a
hairdryer (my choice, it is quicker) to dry it, including from underneath by
lifting up the sheet/tablecloth. §
Drizzle melted butter all over the dried dough,
possibly using a brush to help spreading it over. §
Sprinkle sugar all over the buttered dough (keeping a
handful of sugar to mix with the apple slices). §
Remove with scissors the hanging thickest edges that
would not bake crispy. §
Butter a round pie pan/mold pan. §
Draw circles slightly larger than the size of the
mold with a thin-bladed knife and place 5 or 6 circles in the bottom of the
mold. §
Spread the apples on top, then cover with 5 or 6
circles, and add the trims as a “chiffonade” on top to give volume and
crispiness. §
Bake at 400 for around 30 minutes. §
Drizzle the apple Armagnac “marinade” on top. §
Serve lukewarm… with a shot of Armagnac! |
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