Apple Pear Galette

 It's September, and it must be apple time. 

The fall season offers a wide variety of apples to choose from. For me, Honeycrisp has met its match with a variety called SweeTango. This apple has a satisfying crunch and a juicy blast of sweet-tart flavor. It's quite delicious!

There are so many varieties of apples available in stores and at farmers' markets these days that it can be challenging to choose apples for baking. In the past, a baker might have reached for sweet-tart Granny Smith apples without a second thought, but many different kinds of apples will work just as well, if not better, in baking pies, crisps, and other apple desserts.

Texture and taste are the two most important qualities to consider in a baking apple, and the apple that you like best for everyday snacking might not hold up when put into a pie. Apples need to retain their shape and not turn into applesauce during baking. The best apples will offer a little bit of resistance (keep a little hint of crunch) even after a long time in the oven. Baking apples should also not be too sweet, since most pie recipes call for a fair amount of sugar. The sugar serves as a flavoring and helps thicken the juices of the apples as they cook. Cutting it down to compensate for super-sweet apples can sometimes alter the outcome of the final pie.

Granny Smiths are always a decent choice for pie, as they are easy to find, will hold up during baking, and can take a lot of extra flavor from sugar and spices. Jonathan, Jonagold, and Pippin apples are other excellent sweet-tart choices. Gravenstein, Braeburn, Fuji, and Pink Lady Apples are all crisp and sturdy, as well. Red Delicious and Golden Delicious, despite their promising names, are not good choices for baking, and neither are Gala and Cortland,d since they tend to become mealy in pie fillings.

Change up your apple pie by adding in pears, shape it into a galette form, and enjoy a slice of Apple Pear Galette this Labor Day Weekend

Cook’s notes: A galette is a free-form pastry, baked without a pie or tart pan. The dough is easy to make and much more forgiving than pie crust. The dough is rolled out flat and then folded around the filling. It doesn’t matter if the crust tears a little or if the fruit juices leak out—galettes are supposed to look rustic. A prepackaged frozen pie crust thawed, can be substituted for a homemade pie crust. Any mixed fruits (3 cups) e.g. blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, can be substituted for the pears and apples.

Ingredients:

• 1 rolled homemade pie crust, or use a prepackaged crust
• 2 Granny Smith apples and 2 pears, peeled and diced for a total of 3 cups of fruit
• 2 tablespoons of granulated sugar and 2 tablespoons of all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon or 1 teaspoon Saigon cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 beaten egg mixed with ½ tsp. water (egg wash)
• 2 tablespoons of sugar mixed with ½ teaspoon of cinnamon to sprinkle on the crust
• Handful of diced almonds

Directions:

• Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Peel and dice apples and pears.
• Mix diced apples and pears, 2 tablespoons sugar, flour, cinnamon, and lemon juice.
• Roll the crust out on floured wax paper to the size of a dinner plate (about 10 inches)
• Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Transfer piecrust to a lined baking sheet.
• Place filling in the middle of the rolled crust, leaving a minimum of one inch around the edges. Sprinkle crumbled almonds on filling.
• Gently fold the first edge in about one inch toward the center. Rotate slightly around the shell and fold the next piece, pinching together the overlapping “corner”. Repeat until all edges have formed what may appear to be a rustic pentagon, hexagon, heptagon, or octagon.
• Brush the crust with water or a milk egg wash on the folded-over parts of the crust.
• Sprinkle crust with cinnamon sugar mixture. Bake for 10 minutes at 425 degrees. Turn the oven down to 400 degrees and bake 20 minutes longer. If the galette browns too quickly, tent tinfoil over it.
• Remove the cooked galette from the oven, cool for 5 minutes, and transfer the galette on parchment paper to a wire rack to complete cooling.