Michelle Darmody: How to bake a perfect rhubarb and raspberry galette

I decided my freshly picked rhubarb needed a special use

Don't handle your pastry too much or you will get the famous soggy bottom.

A friend gave me a tuft of rhubarb two years ago. It was not that appealing: long straggly roots and a big clump of clay. He warned me with a smile that it was vivacious. 

I dug a hole and almost buried the clump by a fence in my garden. Two years on the leaves are stretching in the early spring sunshine and the stalks are a baby pink and ready to be picked. 

The plant is beginning to edge its way along the fence and I have a feeling I will have rhubarb for many years to come.

It is tempting to simply roast the freshly picked stalks with some orange juice and honey and have them on top of my morning porridge, but I decided they need a special use. A galette is a nicely presented pie that you can make on a flat baking tray. The edges just need to be folded up and pinched and tucked so they form a parcel that holds the filling inside.

If you are really stuck for time, you can make this recipe with pre-made puff pastry instead of making a batch of shortcrust as I do here.

Rhubarb and Raspberry Galette

recipe by:Michelle Darmody

If you are really stuck for time, you can make this recipe with premade puff pastry

Servings

8

Preparation Time

 30 mins

Cooking Time

 40 mins

Total Time

 1 hours 10 mins

Course

 Baking

Ingredients

• For the pastry

• 225g flour

• 1 pinch of salt

• 140g of cold butter, cut into cubes

• 55g caster sugar

• 1 egg, lightly beaten

• For the filling

• 1 egg, separated

• 200g raspberries

• Zest 1 orange

• 1 tbs raspberry jam

• 400g rhubarb, cut into batons

• 1 tbsp dessert wine

• 10g of granulated sugar

Method

1. Mix the flour and salt together and rub in the cold butter until it looks like rough breadcrumbs, do not over mix.

2. Stir the sugar into the egg, mix it lightly until it begins to dissolve. Add this to the flour with a fork. Bring everything together with your hands then rest the pastry for an hour in the fridge or overnight.

3. Roll the pastry to a disc about 15 inches in diameter.

4. Slide the disc onto a sheet of baking parchment and then slide this sheet onto a large flat baking tray.

5. Place the baking tray into the fridge to allow the pastry to cool.

6. Preheat your oven to 220ºC/gas mark 7.

7. Mash the raspberries and stir them and the zest into the jam and set aside.

8. Toss the rhubarb in the sweet wine.

9. Brush the centre of your cold pasty disc with egg white.

10. Spread the raspberry mixture in the centre of the cooled pastry disc where the egg wash was brushed, leaving about three inches around all sides.

11. Arrange the rhubarb on top of theraspberry mixture.

12. Fold the edges over the filling to create an overlapping crust. Pinch the sides of the pastry up around the rhubarb so that it forms a little dish that firmly holds thefilling.

13. Beat the egg yolk and brush it over the pastry and sprinkle the sugar over it so it sticks to the egg.

14. Place the tray into the centre of your preheated oven.

15. Bake for 10 minutes then turn the oven down to 200ºC/Gas mark 6 and bake foranother 30 minutes until the pastry is golden.

16. Allow to cool on the tray until it is cool enough to handle then very gently slide it onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Baker's tips

It is advisable to keep your pastry cool at all times and not to handle it too much. Handling it and making it greasy will mean that it will not crisp up when baking and you will get the famous soggy bottom. Mixing the sugar into eggs helps the sugar to dissolve so it blends into the pastry quicker with less mixing.

I use a jam like Folláin’s raspberry jam that has a nice fruit content; either the sugar or no-sugar version will do.

You can add a few grams of light muscovado sugar to the rhubarb if you feel it is not sweet enough. The sweetness level of rhubarb varies quite a lot.

Drain any excess sweet wine from the rhubarb as it will make the filling too wet.

It is advisable not to add too much flour to the work surface when you are rolling the pastry. It is tempting to coat the surface with a generous dusting of flour but adding too much can cause the pastry to dry out and toughen.

Make sure the pastry is pinched tight, so it does not unfold or lose shape during baking. Ensuring the dough is cold before you start shaping it will also help prevent this by stopping the dough from shrinking.

Having the oven temperature very high to begin with will ensure a nice crust, but it will also help to firm up the shape of the pastry and stop it unfolding and allowing the filling to leak out.

Three delicious variations

Peach and raspberry galette

In place of the rhubarb, you can use 400g of stoned and sliced peaches. The raspberry filling will work very well with peach. They are a classic combination. If your peaches are soft and ripe you can just use them as is, but if they are a little bitter, you can also toss them in some sweet wine.

Nutty apple and raisin galette

It is nice to make a frangipane filling and top it with apples, some mixed nuts, and raisins. It is a winner all year round. To make the frangipane, beat 50g of soft butter and 50g of golden caster sugar together until pale and fluffy, add in one egg and whisk until combined, then gently stir in 100g of ground almonds. Smooth this over the rolled pastry disc, leaving three inches all around the edges. Peel, core, and cut 350g of cooking apples into cubes. Toss these cubes with 50g of chopped mixed nuts and 100g of golden raisins, and 1 tbs of a sweet dessert wine. Spread this over the frangipane and continue the recipe as instructed above.

Plum and almond

This galette is also made with a frangipane layer. To make it, beat 50g of soft butter and 50g of golden caster sugar together until pale and fluffy, add in one egg and whisk until combined, then gently stir in 100g of ground almonds. Smooth this over the rolled pastry disc and top it with 400g of sliced plums.