flipQuetsche Tart
Quetsche Tart
Why this dish? The quetsche, a blue plum from eastern France, ripens in late summer in the Ardennes and Lorraine orchards that the young Rimbaud roamed during his footloose escapes through the countryside.
A thin tart filled with pitted quetsches, both sweet and tart. It was the Sunday and village-festival pastry, when the bread oven was still hot.
At the end of August, the quetsches bent the branches along the paths where I escaped, empty sack and full head. They were arranged standing up, packed tightly on the dough like blue soldiers, and in the oven they gave off a purple juice to damn oneself for. Cut it warm, sprinkle with sugar — and too bad if you burn your fingers: patience was never my strong suit.
- •Ripe quetsches — a full apron (tart fruit)
- •Flour and butter — for the dough (base)
- •Sugar — a handful (sweetness)
- •Cinnamon — a pinch (aroma)
Quetsche Tart
A thin tart filled with pitted quetsches, both sweet and tart. It was the Sunday and village-festival pastry, when the bread oven was still hot.
Why this dish? The quetsche, a blue plum from eastern France, ripens in late summer in the Ardennes and Lorraine orchards that the young Rimbaud roamed during his footloose escapes through the countryside.
At the end of August, the quetsches bent the branches along the paths where I escaped, empty sack and full head. They were arranged standing up, packed tightly on the dough like blue soldiers, and in the oven they gave off a purple juice to damn oneself for. Cut it warm, sprinkle with sugar — and too bad if you burn your fingers: patience was never my strong suit.
Ingredients (period version)
- Ripe quetsches — a full apron (tart fruit)
- Flour and butter — for the dough (base)
- Sugar — a handful (sweetness)
- Cinnamon — a pinch (aroma)
Ingredients
- Quetsches — 800 g (tart fruit)
- Shortcrust pastry — 1 base (base)
- Sugar — 80 g (sweetness)
- Fine semolina or almond powder — 2 tbsp (absorbs juice)
- Cinnamon — 1 pinch (aroma)
Method
- Preheat oven to 200°C and line a tart pan with the shortcrust pastry.
- Sprinkle the bottom with semolina or almond powder to absorb the juice.
- Cut the quetsches in half, pit them, and arrange them standing up tightly on the pastry.
- Sprinkle with sugar and a pinch of cinnamon.
- Bake for 35–40 minutes until the fruits are slightly caramelized; serve warm.
How it was made : The residual heat of the bread oven was used after bread baking to cook tarts. Plums, abundant and free from the orchard, were the democratic dessert par excellence; the surplus was made into jam for winter.
The contemporary twist : A dash of mirabelle eau-de-vie on the hot fruits as they come out of the oven, a nod to the distillers of eastern France.
Arthur Rimbaud · Charactorium
