Rosemary Salted Caramel & Apricot Tarte Tatin
Why this one?
It's strange how my mum was the main cook in the family and made really delicious food but some of the meals that have stand out memories for me were cooked by my dad - perhaps it's the novelty of it which solidifies the memories or maybe it's that when he cooked it was like a celebration with the family. A grand entrance into the dinning room, his facing brimming with pride and 'ooohs ' and 'ahhhs' from the rest of the family is what I remember when my dad made his signature dessert - tarte tatin. I remember the golden colour of the caramel and the beautifully positioned apples snugly sat in a blanket of puff pastry.
Since I've got older my dad and I have had a tarte tatin off's, seeing which of us makes the best one. Conveniently I have forgotten who won, this probably means it was him.
So when I saw the apricot tarte tatin in SLOW it was added to the 'to make' list straight away.
Apricots are just coming into season at the moment so I was waiting until I could get them at the market before making the dish. This week they were there, in all their fuzzy, plae orange glory. Gizzi offered an option to make puff pastry or buy it, I chose the brought stuff. I mean I know we've got time on ours hands in lockdown but I don't have THAT much time.
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Find the recipe here...sorry I can only find the recipe online behind a paywall at https://www.eatyourbooks.com/library/recipes/2210984/rosemary-salted-caramel--apricot
Any substitutes?
Any substitutes?
Oh I thought I'd done so well and didn't use any substitutes for this 6 ingredient dish but just re-checking the recipe sadly I did substitute. The culprit was caster sugar, lockdown is making the availability of caster sugar akin to spotting a flying pig. I simply cannot get hold of any so I used granulated sugar instead. The actual cooking of the dish
As this dish only took 20 minutes prep and 20 minutes cooking I made this after our dinner on Sunday. As much as I have enjoyed cooking slowly, it was also really great not to have to plan the whole day around cooking a dish. I mean, in lockdown it's not really an issue but, still, a change is nice.
This was the first time I'd made caramel, I learnt that you mustn't stir the sugar and just let it caramelize by itself - another skill learnt. Waiting for the sugar to 'start to caramelise' was a drenching in self doubt. What did these 3 seemingly obvious words mean? After much deliberation, and questions fired at my husband about what 'start', 'to' and 'caramelise' meant I decided that the sugar all needed to be melted and that it needed to have a little bit of a golden colour. I am sure my dad would be able to provide a very detailed description of what the caramel should look like but without him standing next to me I had to go on the hoof.
Placing the halved apricots into the caramelly, buttery frying pay was joyful. Seeing the 20 little half orbes glistening, fitting perfectly into the pan made me feel like such a pro. It was similar the feeling I have when a day pans out just right and you can't imagine how it could ever have gone wrong.What I thought
It looked beautiful and just like the picture and then i tasted it -sticky, gooey, golden pastry, the bit I savour the most of any tarte tatin is where the pastry meets the fruit - the pastry slightly soft from the fruits liquid and silky from the butter. Absolute heaven.
Each mouthful was buttery and the pale caramelized flesh of the apricots dissolved in my mouth, and then my tastebuds were subtly tickled with a wild, earthy tone of the rosemary. I've always liked herbs in sweet dishes and apricots and rosemary is a winning combo.
However, there was one disappointment, the sweetness. Every tart tatin I've had has been so sweet, needing lashings of cream to cut through the tooth decaying dish, however this one wasn't like that. Some may enjoy this more than a traditional version if sweet things aren't your thing - I've been told those people exist. But I have a serious sweet tooth and just prefer a sweeter dish. On reflection it could be down to the apricots, although they are in season at the moment it is the beginning so perhaps later in the season the fruits will have a higher sugar content and be more preferable to my palet.
Difficulty: Easy providing you have the right frying pan. If you do - give it ago.
Tastiness rating: 8/10
Next time I'd....I will be trying this later in the apricot season or I may try it with tinned apricots. I am also planning to make it with plumbs or peaches.
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