Apple tarte tatin

The French upside-down tart: apples cooked in deep golden caramel under a puff pastry lid, then flipped out glistening. Serve warm with cream or ice cream.

Ingredients

• 120 g Caster sugar
• 60 g Butter, cubed
• 6 Apples, eating apples like Braeburn, peeled, cored and quartered
• 2 ml Vanilla extract
• 320 g All-butter puff pastry, ready-rolled
• 200 ml Double cream, or ice cream

Method

1. Heat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan). You need a 22–24cm ovenproof frying pan or tarte tatin tin.
2. Sprinkle the sugar over the pan and heat gently without stirring, swirling now and then, until it melts into a deep amber caramel. Take off the heat and stir in the butter and vanilla (careful: it spits).
3. Pack the apple quarters in tightly, rounded side down, and cook over a medium heat until the apples start to soften and the caramel bubbles up round them.
4. Cut a circle of pastry a little bigger than the pan, lay it over the apples and tuck the edges down the inside. Prick a few holes.
5. Bake until the pastry is puffed and deep golden.
6. Leave for 5 minutes, then put a plate over the pan and, wearing oven gloves, flip it over in one confident move. Serve warm with cream.