Sour Cherry Tart
Published September 16, 1989
- Total Time
- 1 hour 30 minutes, plus 2 hours' refrigeration
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
THE PATE BRISEE (ENOUGH FOR 1 11-INCH TART)
About ¾ cup flour (4 ounces)
½ teaspoon sugar
⅛ teaspoon salt
¾ stick (3 ounces) cold unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces
3 tablespoons ice-cold water
THE FILLING
1 ¼ pounds sour cherries, pitted
2 tablespoons minute tapioca
¾ cup sugar
¼ teaspoon almond extract
¼ cup almonds ground in a food processor with 1 tablespoon sugar
Preparation
- Step 1
For the pate brisee, place the flour, sugar, salt and butter pieces in owl and crush the butter into the dry ingredients with the tips of your fingers until combined somewhat but with pieces of butter still visible in the mixture. Add the ice water and stir with a fork just until the mixture holds together. Gather it up, pressing it between your hands to flatten it and make it round, and wrap it in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for one hour.
- Step 2
Rub a small amount of flour into a pastry cloth and roll the dough into a very thin circle, about 12 ½ inches in diameter. Roll the dough onto the rolling pin and gently fit it into the bottom and up the sides of an 11-inch tart pan with a removable bottom. Press the dough against the sides of the pan to fill in any holes and make it adhere to the metal. Remove any excess overhanging dough by rolling the rolling pin across the top of the pan. Refrigerate the tart shell for one hour.
- Step 3
Meanwhile, in a bowl combine the cherries, tapioca, sugar and almond extract. Sprinkle the ground almond-sugar mixture in the pastry shell and arrange the cherry mixture on top. Place the tart pan on a cookie sheet and bake in a 400-degree oven for one to one-and-a-quarter hours, until the dough is nicely browned. Unmold and serve with strong coffee.
Private Notes
Comments
I don't have an owl for step one. And I'm not sure how I would put the pieces in one if I had one. Does anyone have any tips. I'm going to try this recipe and use a bowl instead.
Forgot to add that I baked it at 400 degrees for 35 minutes.
I used two cans of cherries packed in water for a 9 inch tart.
I made this with canned sour cherries, a 9 inch tart shell, and no ground almonds. It was very good served warm with bourbon vanilla bean ice cream. I sprinkled some sliced almonds on top instead.
This is my favorite thing I've ever baked. It's so simple, but SO good. Made it half a dozen times now, always spectacular. I make the dough in the food processor. I have sometimes subbed cornstarch with no issues. I have also made it with less than the full amount of cherries; just cut them in half to get better coverage in the crust and scale down the sugar. I also make it with a full cup of flour and stick of butter, scaling up the sugar and salt. It tastes so good.
This was a great discovery when my husband and a kid returned from the farmer’s market with some seriously sour cherries. I didn’t reduce the sugar by much as the cherries were so sour but I definitely could have taken more away. I used a 9-inch pie pan because that’s what I had. The crust was very thin, not sure how I could have rolled it to fit the recommended size. That said — the pate brisee was simple to make and the pastry shell came out perfectly (but if making again I might take other suggestions to increase salt). Overall a huge winner and will now seek out the sour cherries myself when in season to make this yearly.
We found tart cherries at the farmers market. I also had half a Julia Childs’ pie crust recipe in my frig. I made the tart with Julia’s pastry. I also doubled the tapioca because my cherries were quite juicy. I baked it as directed, but I put apiece of tin foil on top of the pie for about half the time. It was delicious,