This recipe is from Julia Child — I searched around to find the best recipe and Julia's wins, hands down! Follow the instructions exactly and it works perfectly, trust me I made 5 last week. First you need to make the dough:
Paté Brisée
(enough for 2 Tarte Tatin tops)Ingredients
1 1/2 cups AP flour
1/2 cup cake flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter
1/4 cup chilled vegetable shortening
1/2 cup ice water
Procedure
Put both flours, salt, and sugar into container of food processor. Add diced, chilled butter and pulse 5 or 6 times to roughly break up butter. Now add shortening and immediately add the ice water. Pulse 2 or 3 times it should look like a bunch of small lumps. Do not over-mix! Turn out the dough and with the heel of your hand, push the dough out and fold back. Do a few times then form dough into a flattened ball, wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 2 hours before using. This will keep for 2 days in your refrigerator.
Tarte Tatin
Ingredients6 golden delicious apples
Grated zest and juice of 1 lemon
1 1/2 cups sugar
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
8 ounces pastry (Paté Brisée)
Whipped cream for garnish
Procedure
Peel, core and cut apples into 1/8s. Toss with lemon juice and zest and 1/2 cup of sugar. Let sit for 20 minutes and drain liquid. In a well-seasoned, 9-inch cast iron pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the remaining sugar and a drop of lemon juice and cook till mixture gets brown and bubbly. Remove from the heat and carefully place the apples into caramel in a circle pattern and layer extra apples on top.
Preheat the oven to 400. Set the apples back over medium heat and baste the mixture using a turkey baster so the apples get glazed with the bubbling caramel. Cover and cook for 20 minutes, basting often to cook the apples. Now remove from the heat and roll out your pastry. You want to roll out a circle 1 inch larger than your pan. Carefully and quickly place the pastry on top and press the edges down around the sides. Cut 3 steam holes in the pastry and place in the oven for 20 minutes until the pastry is brown and crisp. Immediately turn out of pan onto flat platter. Don’t worry if some of the apples stick, just put them back in place. Serve with whipped cream.
