Castellon's Kitchen: Apple Cardamom Tart

The holidays are fast upon us and I'm feverishly working on some new Thanksgiving dishes, starting with this comforting Apple Cardamom Tart. An absolutely delicious, not too sweet alternative to apple pie. It begins with a buttery sweet pastry crust, layers of tart Granny Smith apples sauteed in butter, sugar and honey, and topped with an easy condensed milk custard delicately spiced with cardamom. Serve it warm out of the oven with vanilla ice cream or at room temperature with hot tea or coffee. Perfect for the holidays!

🍏🍏🍏The french sweet dough (Pate Sucree) recipe is definitely worth the trouble and is best made a day ahead, but if you don't have that kind of time, feel free to use your favorite pie crust recipe. 🍏🍏🍏

Apple Cardamom Tart

(Pate Sucree recipe from Teri Appleton Villanueva and adapted tart filling recipe from Del's Cooking Twist via Yummly)

Make dough one day ahead.
Pate Sucree (French Sugar Dough)

3 egg yolks
1/4 cup ice water
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
pinch of salt
8 oz. cold butter, unsalted, cut into pieces

Lightly beat egg yolks with ice water and set aside. In a food processor, pulse flour, sugar and salt until combined. Add butter and process until mixture resembles a course meal, about 20 seconds. With machine running, add egg mixture in a slow steady stream. Process until dough just begins to hold together. do not process more than 30 seconds. Shape dough into a flat disk, wrap in plastic and refrigerate until firm. About 30 minutes or overnight.

Prepare tart pan (I used a ~8-inch diameter tart pan) with cooking spray and cut out a parchment circle that fits the inside bottom of the pan. Smooth out any air bubbles created between the parchment and the cooking spray. Set aside.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough to a 12 inch circle and fit it in your tart pan, taking care to work the dough up the tart pan sides. Using a rolling pin, cut the excess dough.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees, Freeze tart pan for 30 minutes while the oven comes up to temperature. Remove tart dough from freezer, line tart dough with pie weights and bake blind for 20 minutes to set sides. Remove pie weights and bake another 15-20 minutes. Leaving the oven on, set the baked tart shell aside to cool a bit. While the tart dough bakes, prepare the filling.

Apple Tart Filling
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled and sliced
1/4 cup butter, unsalted
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1/4 tsp. ground cardamom
2 eggs

Peel and slice apples. I used an apple slicer/corer and then sliced the apple slices in half again. Squeeze a bit of lemon juice on the apple slices to protect them from browning. In a large skillet, melt butter and sugar. Add apples and honey. Stir to coat and let apples simmer about 5 minutes. Remove apples from pan and set aside. add condensed milk to the butter sugar remaining in the pan. Simmer on low, stirring continuously for about 3 minutes. Add 1/4 tsp cardamom and remove from heat. Allow to cool for a bit. Beat eggs and quickly stir them into the condensed milk sugar mixture.

Assemble your tart. Place apples in tart shell and pour the condensed milk sugar mixture over the apples.

Bake at 375 degrees on the bottom rack of the oven for about 25-30 minutes or until custard begins to turn golden brown. Cool and serve warm or at room temperature. Enjoy!