SHF #9: Falling Apart with an Apricot-Pluot Tart

"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold..."
    - William Butler Yeats
It looks pretty, doesn't it.  Well, that was before we cut into it.  Pretty is as pretty does.  You know how it is with those custard and fruit tarts.  Unless you glue them together with a ton of sticky glaze instead of the preferable light sheen, they do tend to fall apart upon the moment of cutting and serving.  And that tendency is only heightened by a crumbly walnut crust and a pastry cream filling lightened with mascarpone cheese and well...there's a reason why I'm not showing you how it looked when it was plated, so to speak. 

The first picture also doesn't really show how challenged I was when I tried to make a gorgeous whirling swirling design with my fruit, and ended up with a partial tart of whirling swirls, and then just a lot of room that needed to get filled in by fruit.  Next time I'll do this more mathematically, and figure out where the center of the tart actually is so that I have a place to begin my pinwheels of jewel-toned fruit.  Below you can see how the design got sidetracked:

However, this tart's refusal to slice neatly or to arrange itself into a perfect swirl pattern had no effect on its flavor.  Truthfully, the combination of fragile, cookie-like walnut tart crust, rich mascarpone pastry cream and slices of fragrantly ripe apricots and pluots brushed lightly with apricot glaze made a rather delectable summer dessert.  And it all came about by chance. 

I was determined to participate in this month's Sugar High Friday, having missed the last one.  Knowing that I'll be out of town all next week, it seems unlikely that I'll get anything posted for Viv's eggciting IMBB.  So that was all the more motivation to make something sumptuous for this month's theme of tantalizing, titillating, tempting tarts, brought to us by the amazing folks at life in flow, who also bring us the vital food porn watch. 

I decided to cook with what I had in the house.  Fortunately, I tend to keep lots of baking and cooking ingredients in the pantry and fridge at all times.  I'd been on a recent fruit-buying binge, so I knew that the apricots and pluots were just begging to be used.  In addition, there was a lovely container of mascarpone in the back of the fridge.  So the combination was waiting to happen, and happen it did.  We enjoyed our crumbly, fall-aparty slices last night after the tart had its photo op.  Hopefully you'll be able to tune in to the comments section a bit later on to see what my workmates (who really look forward to Sugar High Fridays) think of it...

Apricot-Pluot Tart with Mascarpone Custard and Walnut Cookie Crust

Walnut Tart Pastry

2 cups + 2 Tbsp. flour
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup ground walnuts
1 cup cool butter, cut in chunks
2 egg yolks

Preheat oven to 350F.  Place flour, sugar, salt and walnuts in the workbowl of a food processor.  Pulse to mix.  Add butter in chunks, and pulse until the butter is in pea-sized lumps.  Add egg yolks, and pulse just until a dough is formed.  Take it out and knead it very lightly to mix.   Press into a fluted tart form with removable bottom (this filled a 10" tart form, with quite a bit left over.  It would probably make 2 8" tarts).  Chill for 30 minutes, and then bake for 25 - 30 minutes, until nicely browned and cooked through.  Baking time will depend on the thickness of the tart dough as well as your oven's eccentricities, so it's wise to check the crust regularly from 15 minutes baking time on.   Remove from oven, and cool on a rack.  Don't remove the fluted tart ring yet. 

Mascarpone Crème Pâtissière

1 cup whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup + 1 Tbsp. sugar
1 whole egg
4 egg yolks
2 Tbsp. flour
2 Tbsp. cornstarch
1 tsp. vanilla bean paste
8 oz. Mascarpone cheese

Beat the egg, yolks, flour, cornstarch and 1 Tbsp. of sugar together in a bowl until light and lemon colored.  Heat the milk and cream together with the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar until steam begins to rise from it.  Slowly whisk half of the hot milk/cream  into the egg mixture until thoroughly mixed.  Then pour this back into the rest of the milk, whisking all the time, and heat slowly until the mixture begins to thicken.  Keep beating/whisking it as it thickens, until a custard that mounds when you drop a spoonful of it back into the pot is formed.  Remove from the heat, and stir in the vanilla.  Whisk again lightly to make sure the mixture is smooth and uniform.  Cool to room temperature, and then refrigerate to chill thoroughly.  When the mixture is chilled, beat in the mascarpone cheese.   Chill again. 

Assembly:

4 ripe pluots or plums
4 ripe apricots
1/3 cup of apricot preserves, heated and strained

Slice fruit into neat crescent-shaped slices.  Fill the cooled Walnut Pastry with the chilled Mascarpone Cream.  Arrange the sliced fruit into concentric circles or a swirl pattern or whatever else might delight you and your audience of tart-eaters.  Brush lightly with the warm strained preserves.  Chill once again to help all the elements set up a bit, and then serve. 

Comments

[Debi]

Julie, that tart was too good for words. Yum.

[Zarah Maria]

Julie, it looks lovely! The "deviation" just shows that this was a tart made by a real person, in her own kitchen - and we all know that real food made by real people is what tastes the best! Now, a question: what exactly is a pluot? Me stupid...

[Sam]

-kudos to another person who cooks with what is in the house already! I am right this very moment midway through making bread from things I had lying around. (Except I don't have a loaf tin - oh well, I guess it will be a freeform loaf).

Arah Maria - here is a post by fellow food blogger Derrick of Obsession With Food who might help you with your question. I had no clue about all these hybrids till I read about them last week.

http://www.sfist.com/archives/2005/06/07/sfist_in_the_kitchen_plumcots_and_apriums.php

[Julie]

Debi, I'm so glad you enjoyed it! Points to you for being the first of the workmates who actually ate this crumbly creation to post a comment...

Zarah, I just revised the post, adding some links to the word "pluot" that give some definitions. I was about to add Derrick's SFist post when I saw that Sam had already done so...

Sam, thanks for putting up Derrick's explanatory post. I wish we had the variety here in the Northeast that you obviously get in the amazing Farmers' Markets out in the lovely Bay area...and yes, there's nothing more satisfying than making something delish with what's lying around the house. Cutting out the shopping time makes cooking that much more of a joy, doesn't it? Ah, the benefits of being a food hoarder. The inside of my pantry boggles the imagination.

[Zarah Maria]

Thank you both of you! I just checked out the link, sounds very interesting... Now if only I could get a decent regular plum around here, I'd be more than happy!

[Nic]

I'll take a crumbly crust over one that's glued together with all manner of gel-ing agents any day. This tart looks great, Julie.

[keiko]

Hi Julie - yes, it does look pretty indeed! I really like the idea of having walnuts in the crust, it must taste wonderful with the fruits and creamy filling...

[Jennifer]

That tart looks gorgeous! I agree with Zarah Maria - it looks like a real person baked it...always a good thing in my books.

Thanks so much for joining in on SHF this month!

[sarah]

oh julie - i don't know what you are talking about...the tart looks gorgeous! as far as the nut crust and mascarpone cream - i had the SAME problem with mine - but we let it chill in the fridge to set a little before serving, which helped a little, i think :) oh well - oozing mascarpone? still delicious :)

[Gina]

I couldn't wait to see the photo of the whole tart, since I only saw the stripey end of it at work & thought it was all that way. I thought it was a delightful alternative to the magazine-page pinwheel! It looked to me like waves of fruit washing up on the beach.

Flavor? Amazing, delicious, indulgent, heavenly. Your workmates truly are in your thrall. I am in awe that this is what you have hanging around the back of your refrigerator. In my kitchen, when I cook with what's on hand, I usually end up with Stone Soup.

[tanvi]

this is gorgeous Julie! i love the idea of a walnut tart pastry- i will keep it in mind for my next tart.

[ejm]

I realize I'm quite late commenting. But I have been searching around for information on fluted pie pans. I see you used one here.

We are just about to make one of Patricia Wells' pies from "At Home in Provence". It is vaguely similar to your pie but made with wheat flour rather than walnuts (so I'm hoping the crust will hold together)

But the thing is, we don't have a removable bottom pie plate. We have a springform pan - but that will have too deep sides, I would think. We plan to make it in a regular pyrex pie plate.

Do you know of any reason, other than for nice looking serving, these pies are to be made in removable bottom dishes?

Incidentally, your pie looks wonderful!

-Elizabeth

[Joe]

Julie,
Had my first Pluot here at camp this summer. Tasted somewhat like a plum skin suffed with sugar water. Did we just get a poor variety or is that the typical flavor? Does cooking concentrate its flavor somewhat? Anyway, I was going to tell you about it when I got back, but as always, you're one step ahead.

Joe

[Julie]

Hi Elizabeth -- I wouldn't use these tins for a standard, pate brisee-type flaky crust pie. But I really like them for a sweet, cookie-like tart crust. It's worth the investment -- they're easier as well as prettier to cut and serve, and I think because the pans are so very thin, the dough bakes well and never comes out doughy.

Hi Joe -- I would say you didn't get good pluots. There are many varieties -- I was just at the Ferry Farmers' Market in San Francisco the other day, and ran across several different kinds that were stupendously good. So don't give up on pluots...