Plum Frangipane Tart has to be one of the tastiest tarts out there … and it looks mighty pretty too! Buttery, flaky shortcrust pastry tart shell is filled with sweet almond frangipane filling and then topped with the most beautifully coloured plum slices. Baked to golden perfection, this tart is divine served cold or warmed with a dollop of double cream.

This tart is a visual showstopper. The natural beauty of those sliced plums hands down turns this tart into a work of art. And to be honest, it isn’t a hard tart to make but I’ll tell you something …. if you produced this at the end of a meal for your friends and family, or brought it round to a mate’s house … you’d get a room full of ooohh’s and aaagh’s! Promise.

Shortcrust pastry time

One of my goals over the next couple of months is to improve my pastry making and develop my understanding of different types of doughs etc. So many recipes call for a food processor to bring the dough together, but I don’t have one and so i’ve got to master it by hand. I think that this will ultimately give me a better understanding for the feel of the dough and how it comes together.

So after a quick google I came across Jamie Oliver’s sweet short crust pastry

On the outset it looked simple enough to make and I’ve made it on quite a few occasions since. It’s a beautiful shortcrust pastry, buttery and crumbly once baked. It complimented the frangipane so well and each step of the recipe worked perfectly.

How to make the dough

Make sure the butter and milk are cold

On your kitchen bench, pour your flour, icing sugar and lemon zest into a mound. Now add the cubed, COLD butter on top of the mound and with cold finger tips start pinching the butter and rubbing it together in between your finger tips. Keep doing this until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Add your remaining wet ingredients

Make a well in your mixture and pour in your beaten eggs and the splash of milk. Use your fingers to mix the two together until the dough just starts to bind together.

Knead the dough

Lift the dough and dust your work surface with flour to prevent sticking. Then lightly knead the dough until until it starts to form a ball and then use your hands to shape it into a flat round, kind of like a 2 cm thick pancake. Wrap the dough in cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes minimum, ideally overnight.

After refrigeration, it’s time to roll

Flour your bench top and a rolling pin, cut the dough from the fridge in half (save one half for another recipe, or freeze it), and then roll out the dough until it’s 3-4mm thick, rotating the disc whilst you roll. Next line a floured, fluted tart tin and cut any excess off with a sharp knife. Then prick the base all over with a fork

Ready for blind baking

The pastry is now ready to be blind baked. To do this, line the pastry with baking paper and fill it with baking beans, or rice and dried lentils as an alternative, and bake in a pre-heated 180C (350F) oven for 15 minutes. Remove the baking paper and baking beans and bake for a further 5 minutes in the oven. Remove from the oven and let cool before brushing an egg wash onto the pastry prior to filling it. You now have a ready to go tart base.

NOTE: The dough made double the quantity for my rectangular tart tin so I used one half for the tart and froze the left over dough. It’ll be perfect for when I don’t want to go to the effort of making dough but want to create a tart at short notice.

Plum Frangipane Tarts ready to go into the oven

Frangipane Filling

I’ve always loved frangipane filling in a tart, as you can pair it with most fruits. Fill a galette or a tart base and top with fruit and you’ll find that the addition of this divine layer to your dessert will add the perfect nutty sweetness.

Made from a combination butter, sugar, eggs and ground almonds, the filling is essentially an almond pastry cream that the French and Italians traditionally use around Christmas.

Almonds pair so well with so many fruits and so the use of frangipane in a fruit tart creates a delectable end result.

To make the frangipane filling

Cream the butter and sugar until pale.

Add the eggs, vanilla extract, ground almonds and salt and stir until combined. Pour into the tart shell and level with the back of a spoon so the mixture fills up the pastry base a couple of mm from the top.

How to lay out the fruit on the Plum Frangipane Tart

We all eat with our eyes right? I’m such a firm believer in making something look as visually appealing as it tastes. All fruit is beautiful in it’s own right. That’s Mother Nature working her magic. But I wanted one where the colour was going to jump right out at you. As so I chose these beautiful in season plums.

With deep burgundy skin on the outside, I knew their colour flesh would be magnificent. And boy was I not disappointed! Would you look at the spectrum of colours spanning from bright orange through to deep, erm, plum colour!

To decorate your Plum Frangipane Tart

Firstly, slice the plums in half and de-stone them.

Secondly, place the open flat side down on your chopping board and then cut into thin slices. I then sorted the slices as per their colour (darkest to lightest), so that I could create an ombre effect on the tart.

Starting from the outside of the tart, and with the darkest plum slice, start laying them next to each other on top of the frangipane mixture, pressing them down slightly.

Continue laying them next to each other spiralling around the tart until you reach the centre.

If you like the look of this fruit tart then make sure to check out more of my fruity desserts. Adding fruit into my desserts is one of my favourite things- I adore it. Here are some of my favourites!

Fruit Pavlova with Roasted Plums and Fresh Figs. Recipe found here.

Lemon Blueberry Bundt Cakes. Recipe found here.

Roasted Strawberry Mascarpone Ice-Cream. Recipe found here.

Plum Frangipane Tart

★★★★★ 5 from 1 reviews

Author: Emma
Prep Time: 25
Cook Time: 45
Total Time: 1 hour 10 minutes
Yield: 16 1x
Category: Tart
Method: Baking
Cuisine: British

Description

Scale

Ingredients

For the dough

525g (3 1/2 cups) plain flour, sifted, plus extra for dusting

80g (1/2 cup) icing sugar, sifted

1 lemon, zest

275g butter, cut into small cubes

2 large eggs, beaten

1 splash milk

For the filling

75g (1/3 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature

120g (1/2 cup) granulated sugar

2 eggs, plus one for the egg wash

1 teaspoon, vanilla extract

180g (1 ½ cups) almond meal

Pinch of salt

Approximately 6 plums

20g (¼ cup) flaked almonds, optional

1 tbsp honey

Instructions

For the dough

On your work surface place your flour, icing sugar and lemon zest into a mound. Add your cubed butter. TIP: ensure your hands are cold so as not to melt the butter. Using your fingers tips, rub the flour, sugar and butter together until it resembles a fine crumbly mixture.
Add the eggs and milk and start working it together until you have a ball of dough. Pat it into a flat round. Wrap it in cling film and place in the fridge for half an hour minimum.
Pre-heat the oven to 180C. Remove the dough from the fridge, dust your work surface with flour, cut the pastry in half and, using a floured rolling-pin, roll one of the pieces out until it’s just under 1/2cm thick. Line your pie tin (round or circular) with the pastry, trimming off any excess round the edges using a sharp knife. Prick the base of the pastry all over with a fork. Line the pastry with baking paper and fill with rice. Bake in the oven for 15 mins until the pastry is firm. Remove the paper and rice and bake for a further 5 minutes.

For the filling

Whilst the pastry is cooling, make the filling, in a large bowl cream the butter and sugar together with an electric beater on medium speed. Add the eggs, extract, almond meal, salt and stir until combined. Whisk the final egg in a small bowl. Brush the par baked pastry crust with the egg wash (this seals the pastry and prevents it from going soggy with the filling). Pour the filling into the tart shell and spread out evenly.

To decorate

Starting from the outside and working your way in, place your plum slices flat, next to one another, spiralling in on top of the filling. Place the tart back in the oven and bake for 45 minutes, until the filling has browned. Remove the tart from the oven and brush the plums with honey. Sprinkle with flaked almonds and thyme sprigs. Serve with some double cream and enjoy!