Michelle Darmody: How to make apple tart and top tips to get a perfect result

I associate apple tart so much with my grandmother’s kitchen

You can roll out the pastry scraps together and cut into leaf or apple shapes, brush the back of each piece with milk to stick them on top of the pie.

Apple tart is one of the most comforting desserts around, maybe because I associate it so much with my grandmother’s kitchen. The smell of pastry gently turning golden in the oven as the apples soften beneath instantly evokes childhood.

I actually used to like it when the seal around the sides of my grandmother’s tart broke and the bubbling apple juices seeped out from underneath the pastry lid, creating a sticky chewy edge to the tart.