The Apple Tarte Tatin is a quintessentially French dessert. Below, you will find a more classic recipe with options to use puff pastry, phyllo, or pie dough for the crust. Or you can jump down to the Mini Swirled Apple Tarte Tatin recipe that is elegant, beautiful and perfect for parties.
Apples baked in buttery caramel until the apple absorbs the caramel and turn amber. The original dessert is rustic and beautifully humble, just apples cut, placed in a pan with caramel, then baked with the curst on top and inverted.
Not much to look at, but one of the most revered desserts for the rich caramelized apples and flaky pastry. On instagram I saw a version that was so elegant, but still looked equally as delicious. Perfect spirals of apples, baked in caramel and turned out onto puff pastry. HOW did they get those even continuous slices of apples. I have most pastry equipment available to home bakers, but nothing in my pantry could create this shape. A little sleuthing and I found it, my new favorite kitchen tool.
Classic Apple Tarte Tatin
I’ve often said this is my comfort food, the one dessert I almost always choose on a menu (I rarely pick just one) and I start nearly every trip to NYC with a slice from Buvette in the West Village.
The key to success is having the proper apples. You want them to keep their shape while cooking in the caramel, so they absorb the bittersweet sugar and don’t just turn to mush. I’ve had good success with Pink Lady, Braeburn, Honeycrisp, and/or Granny Smith. Stay away from apples like McIntosh, Golden Delicious, and Fuji which break down and make sauce.
Traditionally the crust is a layer of Puff Pastry draped over the caramelized apples and baked upside-down, then inverted to reveal the deep caramel colored apples. The transformation is dramatic and delicious. You can make puff pastry or use a high-quality store-bought version. You can also use pie dough or even sheets of phyllo. The crust is the canvas that holds the apples, so you can get creative with whatever you have on hand. Below I give the instructions for all of the crust options.
Easy Apple Tarte Tatin Recipe
Ingredients
Caramelized Apples
- 7 or 8 apples, peeled, halved and cored use an apple that keeps its shape when cooked.
- 1 cup (200g) sugar
- 4 tbsp (57g) butter
- 1 vanilla bean split in half, scraped
- 2 tbsp Grand Marnier or Brandy optional
Baklava (Phyllo) Crust
- 8 sheets phyllo dough
- 1 stick (113g) butter
- 1/4 cup honey
- Pinch salt
- 1 vanilla bean split, and scraped or 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 cups (185g) walnuts, lightly toasted and chopped into small pieces
- Ice cream for serving
Instructions
Tarte Tatin
- In a 10-inch skillet melt the sugar over medium-low heat, so that it melts evenly, but don’t stir it until at least half of the sugar is melted and turning to caramel. Once this happens stir it and continue to cook until most, if not all the sugar is melted. Add the butter, vanilla bean and booze, give it a good stir and then add the apples. Cook over medium-low heat until the apples are well caramelized, moving them around in the sugar to make sure they are cooking evenly. Once they are cooked, prepare the Phyllo crust.
Phyllo Crust*
- Heat the oven to 375°F with the rack in the middle of the oven.
- Melt the butter, honey, vanilla and salt together in a small pan.
- Brush the mixture over one sheet of phyllo dough, then sprinkle with the chopped walnuts. Drape another layer of phyllo over the walnuts and brush it with the butter mixture and sprinkle with more walnuts. Repeat this with the rest of the sheets of phyllo dough, butter mixture and walnuts, finishing with a sheet of phyllo and butter mixture, but leave the top without nuts. Fold the phyllo so that it is the same width as the pan, then trim the corners and edges to fit over the apples. You want the layered phyllo to be slightly larger so you can tuck it in around the apples a bit.
- Bake for about 20 minutes or until the phyllo crust is golden brown.
- Invert the Tarte Tatin onto a serving dish. If any of the caramel is left in the pan, add a bit more booze and deglaze it. Pour this caramel over the tarte. Serve it warm or room temperature with or without ice cream. Makes a great breakfast too.
Apple Tarte Tatin with Puff Pastry
Preheat oven to 425°F. Roll the puff pastry out to 2 inches beyond the width of the pan. (The pastry will rise up and shrink in width, so be sure it is large enough.) Drape the rolled pastry over the cooked apples and bake for about 20-25 minutes or until the pastry is golden brown and the juices are thick. Invert onto a serving plate as instructed above.
Apple Tarte Tatin with Pie Dough
Preheat oven to 375°F. Swap out the phyllo for a sheet of rolled-out pie dough that goes an inch beyond the width of the pan.
Apple Tarte Tatin Tips
- The type of apple matters: Pink Lady, Braeburn, Honeycrisp, and/or Granny Smith are all good options
- For the classic version, don’t worry about slicing perfectly. The rustic look is part of what makes this a beautiful dessert.
- I always recommend making your own puff pastry, but for an even easier version you can use store bought.
Swirled Apple Tarte Tatin
It is no secret that my knife skills leave much to be desired, so sometimes a sharp tool is required to do the work for me. Apple Ribbon Slicer
The apples: I tried many apples to see which ones would hold up the best. Depending on where you live and what is available, you too may need to do some experimenting. You want firm apples, that will not turn to sauce as they bake.
Granny smith is a great apple, because it holds its shape pretty well and it is tart, so it pairs well with all the caramel.
Braeburn and Honeycrisp will also work well, but they are a touch sweeter.
Video
Equipment
- 8 oz copper souffle molds any oven-safe ramekins will do
- Ribbon apple slicer This is how you get the impossibly perfect apple slices to swirl!
Ingredients
- 6-8 apples see notes, ends cut off and peeled, then sliced into ribbons on the Apple Slicer
- 1/4 cup (57g) salted butter, cut into 8 even pieces, plus more for greasing the pan
- 1 1/2 cups (300g) sugar
- 1 Tbsp corn syrup
- 1/3 cup water
- Puff pastry for the crust see notes for my recipe
- Egg wash one egg mixed with teaspoon water
- Sugar for dusting puff pastry
Instructions
Swirled Apple Tarte Tatin
- Preheat oven to 350°F. If you have a baking stone or steel, preheat that in the lower third of the oven. This will help to bake the Tartes evenly.
- Generously grease the baking dish/es with butter, place on baking sheet and set aside. Baker’s note: I used eight 8-ounce copper souffle molds. Any oven safe ramekins will work. They can be any size, you’ll just have to adjust the size of the spiraled apples and perhaps the baking time. You can even bake one large Tarte Tatin, using all the apple ribbons in one giant spiral. The smaller version may be easier for the first go at this.
- Create the spiraled apples to fit the size of the baking dish you have chosen. The apples should fit easily, but snuggly into the dish. I spiraled the apple ribbons and then cut the spiral in half to create two equal spirals. This seemed a better size for an individual dessert and my apples were quite large, so the ribbons were wide.
Make the Caramel
- In a large saucepan put the sugar in a mound in the center of the pan, be sure it doesn’t hit the sides. Gently add the corn syrup and water, making sure the sugar doesn’t splash up on the sides of the pan. DO NOT STIR.
- If any of the sugar is not dissolved, very gently drag your finger through the sugar until the water saturates it all, but make sure none of the sugar hits the sides of the pan. (All of this care to keep the sugar off the side of the pan will prevent your sugar from crystallizing while it cooks.)
- Cook over high heat, without stirring. When the sugar starts to color on the edges, gently stir the sugar. Until it is quite dark, it will smoke a bit. I like my caramel very dark, with an almost bitter edge. Immediately distribute the caramel evenly into the prepared baking dish/es.
- Place a pat of butter over the hot caramel. Add the spiraled apples.
- Place the apple in the oven and immediately drop the temperature to 325°F. Bake until the apples are tender and the caramel seems to have saturated the apples. The baking time may vary depending on the apples and size of pan. I baked mine for about 1 hour.
- Remove from oven and immediately flip the apples out onto a greased foil lined baking sheet.
Bake the Puff Pastry
- Preheat oven to 425°F Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Defrost the puff pastry as directed. Roll the dough about 1/8″ thick and cut out circles that are just larger than the dishes you are baking the apples in. Set the circles onto the prepared baking sheet. The puff pastry will shrink in diameter as it rises in the oven.
- Freeze the dough until firm again, about 10 minutes. Brush with egg wash and sprinkle generously with sugar. Bake until puffed, golden and set.
Serve
- When ready to serve, heat the apples for a few minutes in the oven, then use a spatula to set them onto the puff pastry rounds, which will shatter the puff pastry slightly. Serve pure and simple or with ice cream!
Zoe:
First, thank you for your cookbooks. They’re terrific.
Secondly, another option which costs more 🙁 but is powered 🙂 is the KitchenAid sheet cutter. If you do a search for; B07QCD9YS1 you’ll find it. (Or you could add it to your Amazon store.
Thank you Rosemary,
I will check it out! Zoë
These look beautiful. What is the little mold you use?
Hi Lisa,
You will find a link to the copper molds in the recipe instructions.
Thank you! Zoë
Espectacular ¡! ¡
Amazing Beautiful tart, always beautiful work Zoe I have your books love it, ❤️
Hi Idalina,
Thank you so much! Zoë
This recipe made me put a fruit and vegetable sheeter on my birthday wish list just to be able to make this recipe! So beautiful!