Brown Butter Apple Tart. The perfect balance of sweet and tart, using two kinds of apples and a hint of cinnamon, this Brown Butter Apple Tart is elegant and delicious and would make a great addition to your Thanksgiving Day dessert table!
There’s something magical about baking pies and tarts in November. For me, they go hand in hand. Pumpkin pie seems to get all the love so today, I’m sharing a Brown Butter Apple Tart .. because I had these ..
And because, brown butter . . oh yeah. . and yes, that’s a vanilla bean.
I love making homemade pie crust. There’s something about combining the flour, sugar, salt, butter and ice cold water, and watching everything come together. It’s beautiful.
And I obviously can’t use just any old flour. The flour and butter are the most important ingredients in my mind. So, I used my enriched all purpose wheat flour from White Lily, it’s one of White Lily’s new Premium Flour Blends.
If you’re from the South, you know White Lily flour. If you’ve baked biscuits, like real Southern biscuits, you’ve heard of White Lily. White Lily is more than just a flour brand, it’s “a Southern institution” and has been around since 1883.
White Lily has teamed up with Shepherd’s Grain® farmers to bring you their first line of premium, Non-GMO Project® Verified flour blends with traceable wheat grown right here in the United States. First, you select your flour. Then enter the code from the back of your flour into the box below to trace the wheat, meet the farmers, and learn more about where the wheat in your bag of flour was grown. I love absolutely this!
So, you can find out where the wheat was grown and it’s delicious!
I’ve been crimping pie crust for what feels like a week . . it’s been my forever nemesis. . . but I’m working on it. Practice, practice, practice!
I absolutely loved this tart. The brown butter adds such a lovely nutty flavor that goes amazingly well with the apples and cinnamon!! And I used granny smith + honeycrisp apples! This tart is not overly sweet and is the perfect balance of sweet, with a little tart.
I hope you check out White Lily flour and bake this apple tart! This would make a great addition to your Thanksgiving Day dessert table!
And be sure to check out the giveaway so you can win the entire line of White Lily’s new Premium Flour Blends!
Brown Butter Apple Tart
Ingredients
For the pastry crust:
- 1 1/2 cups White Lily all purpose wheat flour or all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
- pinch of salt
- 1 stick very cold unsalted butter cut into small pieces
- 1/3 cup very cold ice water + more if needed
For the tart:
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 vanilla bean halved and scraped of its seeds
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 large Granny Smith apple peeled and cut into thin slices
- 2 large Honey crisp apples peeled and cut into thin slices
- 3 tablespoons salted butter
- 1/2 vanilla bean halved and scraped of its seeds
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 tablespoons turbinado sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
Instructions
For the pastry crust:
- Using a food processor, combine the flour with the sugar, salt and butter and process for about 5 seconds. Sprinkle the ice water over the flour mixture and process until the pastry just begins to come together, for about 10 to 15 seconds and resembles coarse, wet sand. Transfer the pastry dough to a lightly floured work surface, gather it together and pat into a round ball or disk. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes. Take the dough out of the refrigerator about 10 to 20 minutes before rolling out.
For the tart:
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Using a small stainless steel saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter, swirling the pan occasionally, until the butter is golden brown and fragrant, about 8 minutes. (The butter should be golden brown. Some foam will subside and the milk solids at the bottom of the pan will be toasty brown. It will smell intensely buttery and nutty.) It should not smell burnt.
- Remove from the heat. Let cool for a bit and whisk in a vanilla bean and the vanilla extract. Set aside.
- Roll out your pastry dough into about a 12-inch round. Transfer to pie plate and let the edges hang over. Cut off the excess pastry dough around the edge of the pie plate and crimp the edges all around. Alternatively, you can use a fork to press in all around the pastry dough edges as well. Prick the pastry dough with a fork, all over the bottom and edges. Add pie weights and bake the pastry crust for about 8 to 10 minutes, or until just slightly golden brown. Remove from the oven and let cool.
- Once cooled, arrange the apple slices into the tart, making a circle with the apples and having them overlap. I used the granny smith apples for the outer edge but you can arrange however you like! Continue with more apples until the tart is full. Repeat with a second layer of apples on top. Brush the apples and crust with the brown butter vanilla mixture, discarding the vanilla bean. Combine the turbinado sugar with the cinnamon and sprinkle over the top.
- Bake the tart until apples are golden brown and the filling is slightly bubbling, for about 25 to 30 minutes. Transfer to a rack and let cool. Serve warm and enjoy!
Recipe adapted from Food 52.
The Giveaway!!
This giveaway is CLOSED.
We’re giving away the entire line of White Lily’s new Premium Flour Blends, plus everything you see above! These flours are truly great and I can’t wait for you to try them! One reader will win! Good luck! Brown Butter Apple Tart + A Giveaway!
Disclosure: This is a sponsored post in partnership with White Lily Flour. All opinions expressed here are my own.
