Apple Galette for New England Fall

It’s no secret that fall in New England is glorious. This weekend I was able to sneak away from New York City for a few days. I am spending a pre-Thanksgiving fall weekend in Maine looking at trees and and sampling the late fall produce. Apples are a Maine fall staple and for a Friday night family dinner I thought the perfect thing to make for dessert was an apple galette. Somehow galettes strike me as less fussy and formal than pies. They are visually striking and easy to make. Here’s mine:

Maine Apple Galette

Crust:

2 cups flour

1 stick butter, chilled but not frozen

1 TBS sugar

pinch salt

3 – 6 TBS ice water

Sift flour, sugar and salt into a bowl. Cut butter into 1 TBS sized chunks and work into the flour with your hands until it forms a crumbly butter/flour mixture, like very coarse sand. Mix in the water a tablespoon at a time until the dough forms a ball. If it’s too wet add a little more flour.

Usually I make my pie crust in the food processor, but it was in the dishwasher, so I made my crust my hand and honestly it tasted so much better. It was not overworked and did not take much long, and there was less implements to clean up.

Making the apple galette in a Maine kitchen!

To make the filling:

3 medium to large sized apples

Zest and juice of 1 lemon

2 TBS sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

For later:

Egg white

2 TBS butter

Slice the apples into sections about 1/4 inch thick (or thinner if you can). If you have a mandoline you can use it to slice the apples very thin as well. Mix gentle in a bowl with the lemon juice and zest, cinnamon and sugar. Note: I do not like my desserts to be overly sweet. If you like it sweeter, add a little more sugar

Assemble:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. On a piece of parchment paper or a silicone mat roll out the dough to be about 15 inches in diameter. Arrange the apples in the center of the dough and leave a 2 inch border. Place four small dabs of butter about a half tablespoon each on the apples. Gentle fold up the edge of the galette over the apples. Slide the parchment paper or mat onto a baking sheet. Brush the crust with egg white.

Gently cover the galette with tin foil and bake for 20 minutes. Remove the tin foil and bake for another 25 to 30 minutes. When the crust is golden brown and the apples below the top layer are bubbling it’s ready. Cool for about 20 minutes and serve with a little vanilla frozen custard. If you are in Maine you should have Hodgman’s Frozen Custard from New Glouster because you stocked your freezer during the summer!