Hello and happy French Friday! I’m writing this from Dublin where we are spending a couple of days before we head home. It’s been a wonderful summer – much more relaxing (yes, even despite the 200km I walked on the Camino and keeping up my running training) than previous years, which was very welcome!
Last year my book had just come out when I was in France and in previous years, we were always doing *something* to do with the house which made our time in France a little less vacation-like than my Instagram might have led you to believe 😉 (but noone’s interested in our trips to the hardware and DIY stores LOL!).
This summer, I had the good fortune to be able to relax a lot more than usual and spent a lot of time reading, played pétanque every afternoon and spent a lot of time with our good friends and neighbours, Brian and Liz. We met Brian a few months after we bought the house (they do not live there full time either) when we showed up on his doorstep with a bottle of nice Canadian wine and a look in our eyes that must have said “take pity on us, we don’t have heating or any furniture or anything, really!” That first visit we were practically camping in the house as we worked through planning the rest of the renos after the roof had been replaced and we were thrilled to be invited back to Brian’s a few days later for the first of many happy apéro hours 🙂 The next summer, we met Liz and the four of us hit it off like we’d known each other for years. Having amazing neighbours is something we are truly appreciative of – both at home in Toronto and in Nérac.
Fast forward five years to August 7th 2019. Five years since we’d signed for the house and close to 10 since Brian and Liz bought theirs. This called for a celebration (hey, any excuse, right?) so we planned a “progressive” dinner (apéros at ours, main course in their kitchen and dessert on their terrace) that we all contributed to. My contribution was inspired by the lovely plums at the market that morning and the knowledge that Brian and Liz loved another plum-based dessert I’d made for them a few weeks earlier.
This is a simple dessert of a sweet tart shell (you can totally use store-bought pastry for this) filled with almond cream and topped with plums (or, really, apricots or any lovely in-season stone fruit), baked until golden with some caramelization on top too… A tart fit for a celebration, that’s for sure! It went down a treat and, of course, with *that view* in the background, it was even better (those of you who follow my Stories on Instagram will know that I post that church picture at least once a day when I am in Nérac!).
A simple tart to capture the flavours of summer! See recipe for the sweet shortcrust pastry here.Plum and almond cream tart
Ingredients
For the almond cream:
For assembly:
For serving
Instructions
Make the almond cream:
Assemble the tart and bake
Notes
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MY BOOK! In the French kitchen with kids is out now! Click here for details and how to order!
This tart looks amazing!! Lucky friends to share it.
I just can’t believe it’s been five years already. Glad to hear that you’re finally able to enjoy the fruits of your labor.