Rheinish Apple Tart

By Preeti

This tart is a traditional recipe which I liked immediately after seeing the simple recipe and looking at its tempting picture in an old cookbook I found recently at my local drugstore, being given away for small donation for a good cause.
Coming from a historical region Rheinland, earlier a part of the Prussian Province, and is still more or less a defined region which is now a part of the state North Rhein-Westphalia (German: Nordrhein-Westfalen) and includes some famous cities like Cologne and Bonn or the historic city of Aachen, to mention just a few.
So, it is not surprising that the region is well known for its culinary specialities as well. One of them being this simple, yet delicate, recipe of an apple tart I found in this book. It is called Rheinische Apfeltorte in German and "Appeltaat" in the region of its origin - Rheinland.

We ate the first round of the tart immediately after taking it out of the oven. I have no words to describe how good it was. The apples just melted in the mouth. It is a wonderful variety of tart apples especially good for baking, but that it was that good was totally unexpected for me. The currents rounded up the taste of the apples so well. I was happy later that I had just the right amount left, as I don't always have them at home. But a much better choice than rasins. And equally good was my decision to soak them properly till they became softer.

This tart eaten cold tasted as good. And my verdict: It was heavenly!

Ingredients

• Shortcrust pastry:
• 300 g all purpose flour
• 100 g sugar
• 1 packet vanilla sugar ( or 1 tsp vanilla essence)
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 egg
• 200 g butter or margerine, cold and cut into small cubes
• flour to roll out the pastry
• Filling:
• 100 g currents
• 750 g tart apples (I used James Grieves)
• 3 tbsp sugar (60 g)
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon (I left it out)

Details

Servings 12

Preparation

Step 1

* add the flour in a large bowl, make a well in the center and add the remaining ingredients
* knead the ingredients of the pastry together into a ball and keep in the refrigerator covered for 30 minutes
* in the mean time prepare the filling: cover the currents in boiling water and soak for 5 minutes in a bowl and drain
* peel, core and slice the apples, cover with sugar and cinnamon mixture (I simply mixed sugar with the apples)
* roll out the dough on a floured surface into a 1 cm thick pastry
* line the bottom and sides of the spring form with the shortcrust pastry
* put the currents in a layer over the pastry , leaving out a small portion to mix with the apples
* arrange the apples on top either in circles or in parallel rows or as per liking
* bake for 30 minutes in a preheated oven at 200°C
* take it out of oven, once done, and let it cool down a bit beofre cutting into pieces
* serve warm or cold, which tastes equally good.