Old school French patisserie  – make it trad with almonds or experiment with other nuts

 

Frangipane is a cream made with butter, eggs and traditionally almonds which provides the most moist and sumptuous setting for all kinds of fruits set in a tart. Flavour it up with amaretto and add cherries, keep it trad with almond extract and plums, add a bit of orange zest and sherry for a “Santiago” type tart, add cinnamon  and make with hazlenuts for a very very sophisticated apple tart, change the nuts and experiment with walnuts, pecans and even pistachios.  Once you have mastered this only your imagination will limit the types of tarts you create. 

Here I’ve made it old school with a bowl and a wooden spoon – as long as your butter is softened, this is all that you need.  My “Go To” recipe is of course my Mum’s one. 

Ingredients

For a 23cm tart

150g butter – softened.  I use salted butter 82% fat content. 

150g sugar or 100g fructose

150g ground nuts (Almonds are traditional but I have made successfully with walnuts, hazelnuts and pecans)

1 drop of almond essence, some amaretto, vanilla essence – whatever you choose the essence will nuance the tart

3 eggs

75g flour or for a GF version I have used a mix of cornflour and rice flour successfully

zest of 1 orange depending on the recipe – works well with quinces and apples

How To

start with very soft butter and cream it (mix it until you can almost not see the sugar or fructose) until it looks fluffy

Now add the eggs. In a perfect world at this stage the mix would not look like a curdled omelette…but sometimes it does.  Try and make sure you incorporate the egg and butter so that you dont end up with “globules” of butter that are too big.

 

Now add the ground almonds or other nuts

stir in gently and add any flavourings you are using

The cream should resemble a slightly wet cake mix.  It should just keep its shape when you pull a spatula through it.  Now it is ready to be used in a tart.