This rustic, delicious pastry is perfect to celebrate a spring. It unites familiar sweet flavors of strawberries with rich, butter pastry.
Although it’s not a strawberry season yet, the first strawberries already started to fill grocery shelves. You can find strawberries almost the whole year in supermarkets here in Croatia, but they just don’t taste that good as those in spring.
I can’t wait for the first strawberries from Vrgorac. Vrgorac is a small town in Dalmatian hinterland, where the best strawberries in the world are grown. People from Vrgorac would say: “Vrgorac strawberries are the best in the world! True connoisseurs can easily recognize them. No berries are so intense, full of flavor, so strong and intoxicating scent, with perfect red color, not too dark, but not too pale. This red is the right red, not matte, but it glows!”. I agree with them.
For this dessert no plates are required. This free-form pie is a rustic dessert you can fill with a variety of berries –but since strawberries are my favorite fruit, it implies that I would make my first galette with strawberries.
Strawberry Galette
Ingredients
Pastry:
- 190 grams 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 115 grams 1/2 cup cold butter, cubed (put it in the freezer 30 minutes before using)
- 4 tablespoons ice-cold water put a cup of water in a freezer 30 minutes before using/or use ice if using water immediately
Filling:
- 450 grams 3 cups fresh strawberries, sliced
- 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
More:
- additional sugar for sprinkling
- 1 egg beaten
Instructions
For the filling:
- In a large bowl add sliced strawberries, sugar, vanilla extract, lemon juice, and cornstarch. Gently stir to combine. Set aside.
Pastry:
- Combine the flour, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. Add the cubed butter, and with a pastry cutter, fork or your hands mix in the cold butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs (peas size crumbs).
- Fill a cup with water and add a few cubes of ice (or take the water out from the freezer if cooled your water that way). From that measure 4 tablespoons and add to the crust mixture. Lightly stir until flour is moistened. Mix the mixture with your hands until it starts to come together in a coarse ball. Add 2 more tablespoons of ice water if the dough seems too dry. Don't overmix the dough.
- Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for 1 hour.
- Preheat oven to 190°C (425°F).
- On a floured surface, roll your dough out into 30 cm (12 inches) circle, set onto a parchment-lined baking sheet; set aside.
- Using a slotted spoon, place the fruit on the center of the dough, leaving 5cm (2 inches) at the edges (so you have the dough to fold up and over).
- Gently fold the edges of dough over the fruit, overlapping the dough as necessary. Press gently to seal the edges.
- Brush the crust with the beaten egg and sprinkle with sugar and bake for 25-35 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and strawberries are bubbly.
- Allow to cool for 20 minutes, slice, and serve!
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