How to Eliminate Pie Anxiety? Design-Your-Own Fruit and Cheese Galette
Fruit and cheese are a culinary dream team. Whether you are pairing a tart apple with slices of sharp cheddar - my all-time favorite snack - or arranging figs and grapes on a cheese board, the sweet-savory combination of fruit and cheese is a perennial favorite.
Fruit and cheese are not only an inspired duo when eaten out of hand, these best food friends also pair well in baked goods. In New England, for example, apple pie is often served with white cheddar. And cheesecake can go from so-so to sublime with the addition of a berry or stone fruit topping.
But pies cause anxiety - what if the filling ends up soupy? - and take at least an hour to bake. As for cheesecake, baking one of those is quite the project. Anything that needs to be baked in a water bath is deal-breaker for me.
To my mind, the ultimate way to bake with fruit and cheese is to combine them in a rustic, free-form galette. Galettes are versatile, easy to put together and they only need 25 to 30 minutes in the oven. Plus, for true fruit-lovers, the fruit-to-pastry ratio is far better in a galette than in a pie.
Apple Galette photo credit Emily Paster
What is a Galette?
A homey French dessert, a galette - also known as a crostata in Italy - is a circle of pastry encasing a filling of sliced fruit. Unlike a pie or a tart, a galette is not baked in a dish or pan, but is free-standing. As a result, while you certainly want your galette dough to be flaky, the dough must also be sturdy and thick enough to hold the filling without leaking.
Although I called it a dessert a moment ago, in truth, galettes can be either sweet or savory. When filled with fruit, a galette is a dessert; when filled with vegetables, a galette can be savory and a satisfying vegetarian entree. It is akin to the difference between a pie (dessert) and a pot pie (dinner.)
The fact that galettes can lean either sweet or savory matters for our purposes because a fruit and cheese galette gently straddles that very line. A galette that combines fruit and cheese can be either a not-too-sweet dessert, a slightly sweet appetizer or, sweet-savory brunch fare. Some fruit and cheese combinations, such as pear and bleu cheese, can even go in a fully savory direction with the addition of sautéed onion, a dollop of Dijon mustard, and a handful of peppery arugula.
Pear and bleu cheese is certainly one winning combination for a fruit and cheese galette. But there are many other possibilities depending on what is in season. Mild, spreadable cheeses, like goat cheese, quark or mascarpone, combine well with soft, sweeter fruits, including figs, berries, plums or peaches. Firm, tart fruits, like apples and pear, work especially well with hard or crumbly cheeses, like cheddar and the aforementioned bleu.
Because there are so many possible combinations, I want to give you a formula, rather than a strict recipe, for a fruit and cheese galette and allow you to choose your own adventure from there. Let's start with the dough. This recipe will produce an all-purpose, flaky pastry crust that has just a hint of nuttiness from whole wheat flour and a little bit of sweetness from a dash of sugar. It works for all possible fruit and cheese combinations - but that being said, if you prefer a more savory galette, simply omit the sugar.
Fig Galette photo credit Emily Paster
Fruit & Cheese Combinations
As always when working with pastry, there are a few techniques that will help ensure a flaky crust without a lot of stress on your part. First, make the dough in advance to give it time to chill and for the gluten to relax. The day before, or even a few days before, you plan to bake the galette is ideal. Second keep your ingredients, especially the butter, cold and leave some larger, pebble-sized pieces of butter in the dough to release steam in the oven and create flaky layers. Lastly, and this is especially important with an all-butter pastry dough, add a bit of acid, like lemon juice or vinegar, as a tenderizer.
When it is time to make and fill the galette, you simply roll out the dough into a circle. Arrange the filling on top of the dough leaving a 2-inch border on all sides, which will be the part of the dough that you fold up and over the filling.
Once the dough is rolled out and ready to fill, there are two different approaches you can take. If you are going with a spreadable cheese, then you will want to soften it, and possibly mix it with something sweet, like honey, and spread it on the bottom of the galette. In other words, the soft cheese forms the base upon which you place your fruit. On the other hand, if you are using a firm or crumbly cheese, the fruit goes on the dough first - with a little flour-sugar barrier to keep the crust from getting soggy - and the cheese is sprinkled on top of the fruit.
However you choose to fill your galette, once you have laid the filling on top of the dough, you will want to fold up the edges to keep everything inside. Brush the crust with a mix of milk and cream for a glossy finish and add a sprinkle of coarse sugar. The galette is baked in a hot oven for a short time - 25 to 30 minutes - and just needs to firm up for a few minutes before slicing and serving.
Below I have suggested three possible combinations of fruit and cheese: pear and bleu, apple and cheddar, and fig with goat cheese. But these are just a few of the many possibilities. If you want to play around even more with a mashup of sweet and savory, you can garnish your galette with some fresh herbs - try thyme for pear, mint for stone fruit and berries, and rosemary for apple. What combinations will you be trying for your fruit and cheese galette?
Pear and blue cheese galette photo credit Emily Paster
Mix-and-Match Fruit and Cheese Galette Recipe
Serves 4 to 6
Dough:
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 TB sugar (omit for a savory galette)
1 tsp. salt
6 oz. (12 TB) cold, unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/4 cup ice water
1 TB lemon juice
Filling:
3 apples, peeled, or 3 pears or 2 pints of figs
Juice of half a lemon (optional - for preventing oxidation of fruit)
3 oz. hard or crumbly cheese, such as cheddar or bleu, grated or crumbled, OR 6 oz. of soft cheese like goat cheese or mascarpone, at room temperature
3 TB honey (optional - for mixing with soft cheese)
1 TB each sugar and flour, mixed together (optional)
Finishing:
1 TB milk
1 TB heavy cream
Turbinado or Demerara sugar for sprinkling
Chopped fresh herbs, such as thyme, mint or rosemary (optional)
1. Combine the flours, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Add the cubed butter. Pulse the dough 15 to 20 times until the ingredients are well-combined and resemble coarse meal. Leave some visible pieces of butter that are the size of gravel. (Alternatively, combine the dry ingredients and butter in a large mixing bowl and cut the butter into the dry ingredients using a pastry cutter or two knives.)
2. Mix the water and lemon juice together and drizzle 4 tablespoons of liquid over the dough. Pulse another 15 to 20 times. Pick up a small handful of dough and squeeze. If it holds together, then it is ready. If not, add more liquid, 1 teaspoon at a time. (If using a regular mixing bowl, stir the mixture with a fork until it comes together.)
3. Transfer the dough to a large bowl. Gather the dough into a ball and knead it against the sides of the bowl until it comes together. Wrap dough in plastic wrap, flatten into a disc, and chill for at least 1 hour. (The galette dough can be made ahead and kept refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for longer periods.)
4. After the dough has chilled sufficiently, remove it from refrigerator. (If the dough has been chilled for several hours or more, let it sit out for 5-10 minutes before attempting to roll it out.) Preheat the oven to 425 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
5. Place dough on a well-floured surface or nonstick rolling mat, and using a well-floured rolling pin, roll dough out in a circular shape until it is approximately 12 inches in diameter and 1/8 inch thick. (Do not roll the dough too thin or it will leak.)
6. Carefully transfer the dough to a baking sheet lined with a Silpat baking mat or parchment paper. Chill the dough on the baking sheet while you prepare the filling.
7. Prepare the filling: For apples, quarter and slice thinly. For pears, cut in half lengthwise, remove the core with a melon baller or small spoon and slice thinly. For figs, cut in half. Spritz the fruit with the lemon juice, as needed, to prevent browning.
8. If using a soft cheese, such as goat cheese or mascarpone, whisk the cheese and honey together until smooth. Set aside.
9. Remove the dough from the refrigerator. If using a soft cheese, spread the cheese on top of the dough leaving a 2-inch border. Arrange the fruit on top of the cheese in concentric circles. Alternatively, if using a hard or crumbly cheese, sprinkle the flour-sugar mixture over the galette dough to prevent sogginess and arrange the sliced fruit in concentric circles, leaving a two-inch border. Top the fruit with the grated or crumbled cheese.
10. Fold the dough over the fruit in a hexagonal or circular shape, as desired, pleating the dough as necessary. (The galette may be prepared in advance up to this point and chilled, covered, for several hours and up to overnight.)
11. Combine the milk and cream in a small bowl and brush it on the outside of the galette for a glossy finish. Sprinkle the dough with the Turbinado or Demerara sugar.
12. Bake galette for 25 to 30 minutes until the filling is soft and the crust golden brown. Cool galette on a wire rack for 10 minutes before slicing. Garnish with herbs, if using and serve immediately.