Recipe: Galette, a free-form rustic dessert, by Linda Marrone

Can you believe that it’s already the first of May? It seems like it took forever to arrive, but I think our nice weather is here to stay. Some of my favorite spring quotes: “If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant” — Anne Bradstreet. “Where flowers bloom so does hope” — Lady Bird Johnson. “Spring is a time of plans and projects” — Leo Tolstoy. “Always it’s spring and everyone is in love and flowers pick themselves” — Cummings

I have been picking lots of daffodils, tulips and hyacinths from our yard. Ralph has been busy planting, weeding and just general maintenance that is always ongoing. For me, you can never have too many flowers or plants, but Ralph doesn’t always share that opinion. I’m always buying and picking. He is always planting and watering.

This Saturday will be the first Early Spring Farmers Market from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. behind Due Sorella in the parking lot at Nevada and Musser streets. There will be mostly local farmers selling everything from assorted greens, veggies, strawberries, honey, eggs, beef, pork, bison and maybe a few early cherries towards the middle of the month. It’s just a taste of what’s to come when the Carson Farmers Market at Third and Curry once again will open the first of June and run until the end of September. Hope to see everyone at the Early Spring market supporting our farmers, and while you are downtown, drop in at some of the local restaurants and businesses.

Galette

The recipe that I’m going to share with you today is easier than making a regular pie.

It’s called a galette. A galette is a free-form rustic dessert. The fruit is arranged on top of a flat round of pastry which is formed directly on the baking sheet. Because they are baked free-form, you can make them any shape you like. I made a small one for us and a bigger one to give away. A standard 2 pie crust recipe would make 3 or 4 smaller or 2 medium galettes. I used rhubarb and strawberries but you can use any fruit in season, apples, peaches, apricots or blackberries.

Use your favorite pie dough recipe and divide the dough into the size you want, roll it out and transfer it to your baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You can even use store bought pie crusts that are rolled up (I would imagine and just roll them out a little more).

Mix your fruit ingredients just like you would for any pie and spread them in sort of a circle leaving enough room at the edges to be able to fold your dough around the fruit. It’s as easy as that. I used about 3 cups of rhubarb cut in 1/2-inch slices and about 2 cups of strawberries sliced and mixed together with 3/4 cup of sugar and 3 tbsp corn starch. I sprinkle the top of my crust with a little cinnamon sugar mixture and put a couple of small pats of butter on top of the exposed fruit. Bake in a 350 oven for 50-60 minutes or until golden brown. Rhubarb is on the tart side and I like to serve this with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.