French Apple Tart

I try and participate whenever I can with the ladies in IHCC, I heart the cooking clubs group. They always have some chef,  whose recipes we will try for a certain period.  Now they are doing Ina Garten. I was not familiar with her shows,  so I checked out. Her recipes are pretty simple and straightforward. This week's theme was French Bistro Recipes,
now I have never been to a French bistro but I  think they will probably have something simple and delicious like this French apple tart. I found this recipe on the Food Network channel.

I used half of the recipe, because it's usually me and my hubby who eat this kind of deserts, while the boys would just take a small bite, say it is nice and when I asked them if they would like a slice they would go no. Well, at least they tasted it.

Making flaky pastry in Maldives at this time of the year is a bit daunting as it is pretty hot, so have to work really quickly so the butter doesn't melt so fast, especially when rolling it.
Apricot jam is not a big favourite in the house so I got one of those mini jam jars  instead of purchasing a large bottle.

Recipe:  French Apple Tart, Recipe by Ina Garten from  Food Network

Pastry
1cup flour
1 tbsp sugar
pinch salt
75g butter, cold, cut into small cubes
ice cold water, a few tablespoons

Topping
2 green apples
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp soft butter
1 tbsp apricot jam
1 tbsp warm water

First, prepare the pastry:  rub the butter into the flour, salt and sugar mix, so they look like rough bread crumbs, and add a few tablespoons of ice water. It should just come together into a ball, don't knead. Pile one into a cling film and wrap it around the ball, flatten and chill in the fridge for 1 hour. I didn't have time when I made it so I placed it in the freezer for 15- 20 minutes.

While the dough chills prepare the apples, peel, slice into quarters and remove the core. Slice into thin slices.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees C .

Take the cling film out. Now this is what  I did, I took a square sheet of baking paper, and laid it out on the workboard. Then the chilled dough on top of the baking paper removed the cling film. Then I laid that cling film on top of the dough and rolled the dough between the sheet of cling film and baking paper, to a thin, but not too thin circle or whatever shape you can manage.  Remove the cling film.

You can neaten it up to make the perfect circle or leave it out. Place the baking paper with the rolled dough on a baking tray. Now arrange the apples in a neat arrangement over lapping each other slightly.  You might have a few slices left, can always eat them right?

Anyway......  where was I ?  ..... Now Sprinkle the sugar on top. It will look quite a lot but believe me it does give the apples a sweet taste, it will get messy but it tastes good in the end.

   Dot bits of the remaining 1 tsp butter around on top, just tiny blobs. Pop it into the oven,  first keep in the bottom shelf then after say 20 minutes remove it and place on the middle shelf. It really depends on how good your oven is, mine can give me trouble at times.

Bake 45mins to 1 hour.  Take it out once it is cooked, I ended up burning the edges but the rest turned out good.  Mix the apricot jam with the water and brush it on top of the apples. This gives the apples that shiny look and also the extra sweet taste.

Cool,cut into slices and serve.

Linkin this over at the IHCC's  theme for this week Ina's Bistro. click link to see what the rest has cooked too...