Apple Galette with Pears and Pecans

Have I mentioned that I love apples?  There is just something wholesome about them.  They perform equally well in a crisp wild rice salad as they do in a warm, gooey pie.  This apple galette is better than pie.  No real fiddling with the crust or worrying if it’s going to shrink.  It’s supposed to look rustic!  Plus, there is an amazing layer of caramel-y pecan-y goodness at the bottom!  I don’t know if it’s the rustic feel, the pecans, or the apples, but it somehow feels wholesome, like you could eat it for breakfast.  (Hey, if you eat it for breakfast, I won’t judge.  I do however feel obligated to tell you that this is not breakfast.  This is pie.)

A few notes about the preparation of the apple galette.  First, if you are afraid of pie crust don’t worry.  As I mentioned, a galette is much more forgiving than a pie.  In order to achieve a flakey crust, you should use very cold butter.  You have a couple of options when it comes to “cutting in ” the butter to the flour.  The first might seem obvious-you can cut the butter into small pieces, toss them in the flour, and then use two butter knives to continue cutting the butter into smaller and smaller pieces until the mixture resembles course sand.  The second option is to use a pastry cutter (if you own one of these, I am going to assume you know how to wield it) if you don’t but are curious about them, using a pastry cutter is like having six knives working at once!  The third option, is to use a cheese grater to grate the very cold butter into the flour.  Toss with your hands, and then use your fingers to press the butter into the flour.   have used all three methods with great success.

The second note, is about the assembly.  As I mentioned, this apple galette is supposed to look rustic.  So relax!  You will basically roll out a huge circle of crust, plop some fruit in the middle, fold up the edges to contain the fruit, and bake.  Easy peasy.  To make things even easier, I usually sprinkle a little flour over my silpat mat or a piece of wax paper cut to fit my baking sheet.  Then, I roll the dough out directly on that.  That way, I know exactly how far I need to fold the edges in for my galette to fit on my pan.  (No one likes a galette drooping of the pan and making a mess of their oven.  I know I said rustic, but come on.)  If I rolled the dough too big, and the edges are meeting in the middle, robbing me of the adorable apples peeking through the center, I just cut the dough back to the right size.  I then re-roll out the scraps, sprinkle them with cinnamon and sugar and bake for about six minutes.  (A little pre-galette snack?)