Apple and Almond Tart

Cue the M&S voice-over; this is no ordinary tart, this is a Neven Maguire Apple and Almond Tart.  You’ll take a mouthful, shut your eyes then probably let them roll a little as cream continues to melt into still bitey apple merging with moist almond custardy filling.  Spoonful after spoonful will disappear with far too much ease and then you will push back on your chair edging away a little from the table, more room will be required for you to sit and savour.

A neighbour gave me this recipe (thank you Anne) and I have never made a tart like this before.  When it comes to pastry making I’ve always done what I was taught in home-economics class and rubbed the butter into the flour with my finger-tips until resembling breadcrumbs.  I’ve seen pastry made in food processors before and it had never dawned on me that while I don’t have a big fancy one I could use my ‘multimoulinette’ gadget instead.  While pastry rested, the filling and apples were prepared.

I did have one difficulty in following the recipe though and it was related to my wallet.  I really did want to stick to it and I could have if I had bought the Vanilla Pods that were stocked in my local supermarket but I couldn’t part with the 6.59 that they cost (for 2).  It just seemed an insane amount of money to part with and meant that I would be pouring 3.30 into the pie in the form of vanilla seeds.  Call me mean but with the alternative of vanilla extract already sitting in the press I just couldn’t justify it.  Perhaps for a dinner party I might go the extra few euro and if you’re planning one then an extra special ingredient would probably take this up that notch but for now I can’t compare!

There is little point in me repeating the recipe here as it hasn’t been adjusted in any way other than substituting 1 tsp vanilla extract for the seeds of 1 vanilla pod so instead you can follow this link if you want to try it out.  The recipe is listed on the new RTE Food website which also features a couple of recipes from Gimme The Recipe (the book) that you can check out here.
In the meantime, happy cooking & baking.
By the way I’d love to hear your comments re Vanilla Pods or other pie/pastry versions you have tried.
Til next time, Sheila.