Directions

• The butter needs to be very cold so it can be grated if you don’t use a food processor like I do, so put a packet of butter in the freezer for 2-3 hours, I usually leave it in freezer overnight. A little trick would be to roll the butter through the flour before putting it on the grater, so that it does not stick to it. Anyway, keep in mind that we are working with a soft dough that contains a lot of butter, so all the ingredients must be cold and we must move quickly in forming the dough.
• In a food processor, sift the flour together with the baking powder and salt. Add the cold butter cut into cubes and start the robot for 1 minute. Using the food processor, we process this step and even the following ones more easily, because the thermal heat of the palms does not come into contact with the butter and thus we avoid melting it.
• Add to the bowl: eggs, cream, grated lemon peel (if desired) and vanilla sugar. Knead quickly in the food processor or by hand just until a ball of dough forms. It will be a sticky dough at first, if you use the robot. We take out the dough on a chopper sprinkled with flour, give it a rectangular shape and divide it in half. Wrap the dough in cling film and refrigerate for 1 hour.
• While our dough rests, we take care of the apple filling. Peel the apples, cut them in half and chop them into cubes of the right size, neither too small nor too big. Sprinkle the apples with the juice from one lemon and mix them well with 2-3 spoons of sugar. In a large non-stick pan, melt the butter and add the chopped apples. Leave on medium heat for 2-3 minutes, then add cinnamon and starch. Mix everything and leave on fire for 1 minute. If you wish, you can add vanilla extract to flavor the apple filling even more. Leave the apples aside until they cool completely.
• We return to our lovely dough, we take only half of it out of the refrigerator, we let the rest cool. Remember that the dough must be kept as cold as possible and handled only as much as necessary. I chose to use a tray with a removable bottom, in which I placed baking paper, then greased it with butter and lined it with 1 tablespoon of flour. Place the dough in the pan, sprinkle as much flour as you can get between your fingers and with the palm of your hand spread the dough in the pan, raising the edges a little. We poke the dough from place to place with a fork, in this way the dough will not remain wet after baking.
• As a small parenthesis, I mention that the pie in question was given to loved ones, so I cut a small part of the obtained dough, let’s say 200 g, and made 2 more mini pies. I used terracotta pots, simply covered only with baking paper. I thought it was a super cute idea and I will definitely make mini pies at the first opportunity.
• We add the apple filling on top of the dough. Take out the second piece of dough from the refrigerator, sprinkle flour on the work table and roll out the dough. With a sharp knife, we cut the dough into approximately 2cm strips and create a cute pattern for our tart. You can of course put the whole sheet over the apples, prick it with a fork and nothing will go wrong. I chose to make it a more classic model, the braided one, which fits perfectly with this tart.
• I did the same with the mini pies. Remove the excess dough and brush the dough with 1 egg mixed with milk. For a more delicious crust, sprinkle caster sugar on top. The pies go in the oven (for me they all went in once) for about 45-50 minutes at 200 degrees. if it seems to you that the crust on top bakes too quickly, cover the pie with a baking paper and reduce the temperature to 180 degrees.
• I can’t describe the smell in the kitchen, it smells like sweet and aromatic autumn poetry. We take the pies out of the oven and let them cool down, if we have patience. I think I walked for an hour in the kitchen and around the house, I was dying to eat. I know it seems like a lot of work, because of the steps, but if we carefully follow all the steps, at the end of the day we will have absolutely delicious apple tarts with crispy dough. Cheers!!!