On our Italiaoutdoor bike trips this summer to the Veneto, we did a really fun cooking event Villa Margherita with our gracious hosts the Dal Corso family. For dessert, we had a wonderful apple creation in which we cored an apple, filled it with apricot jam and crushed amaretti cookies, then surrounded it with puff pastry. Apples are cultivated in both the Veneto and Trentino regions of Northern Italy, with Trentino being home to the Val di Non DOP, a designation bestowed up apples which are grown according to strict quality and cultivation guidelines.

Here, I combined the same flavors in an apple tart. Puff pastry can be a bit laborious to make, but Judy Rodgers offers a simplified version in her book “The Zuni Cafe Cookbook”. It doesn’t “puff” quite as consistently as classic puff pastry, but it is perfect for a rustic tart such as this. I replaced a little flour in the pastry with some finely ground amaretti to bring the almond flavors to the tart crust.

Puff pastry has only a few ingredients – butter, flour, water, salt. It gets its “puff” from the process used to make it, which creates hundreds of thin layers of butter/dough. When you bake it, the butter layers melt and leave an air space between the dough layers. To create these layers, you encase a sheet of butter inside an envelope of dough, then roll and fold and roll and fold and chill and roll and…

In Judy Rodger’s version, she slices the butter very thin and incorporates into the flour and water in a method similar to a basic pie crust. To re-create the layers of butter, she keeps the butter in much larger, flatter pieces than you would for a pie crust, and then finishes it off with a series of rolling and folding, just as in the classic puff. The result does not have the uniform layers achieved with the class puff, but it is wonderful for a rustic tart such as this. It is also a very easy recipe to remember – 1 cup flour, 1 stick butter!

Apple Amaretti Tart

Serves 8

For the puff pastry:

Place the flour, crushed cookies and salt on a counter and mix together.

Cut the butter into 1/4 inch slices. Lay in the flour and coat the butter slices with the flour. Press the slices thin, using your thumb and forefinger. Spread the flour and butter in a circle on the counter and trickle the water over it, one tablespoon at a time, stirring it with your fingers in the butter and flour until it is absorbed. Between each addition of water, use your fingers to lift and move the flour and butter around.

After the water has been added, use a scraper to move the mass together, sliding the scraper under the pile and folding it on top of itself. Then, using the heel of your hand, push down and away on the mass, smearing the mass on the counter. Slide the scraper underneath the mass again, lift and fold on top of itself again. Turn the mass 90°, then using the heel of your hand, push down again on the dough. At this point, all the loose bits of dough should be incorporated, and there should be no dry spots. It will not look smooth or homogeneous in texture. If you still have a fair amount loose bits hanging around, repeat the process of pushing down and away with the dough, then gathering and folding, until it is. Wrap loosely and refrigerate for 30 minutes. If you chill it longer than that, it may need to warm up a bit before it will roll out without cracking.

Measure out a small amount of flour, and dust the counter top and a rolling pin. Roll the dough out, going away from and then toward you, into a rectangle roughly about 18 inches long and 6 inches wide. Fold into thirds (like a letter) from one of the short ends, and then the other. Turn the folded dough 90°, then roll again into the same size rectangle, and repeat the folding process. Rewrap the dough and refrigerate for another 20 minutes.

Repeat this process of rolling, folding, rolling and folding two more times, chilling for 20 minutes in between. After the last set of rolling and folding, refrigerate the dough for at least an hour. At this point, it can be wrapped tightly and kept overnight, or even frozen.

When ready to roll out, make sure the dough is warm enough to roll without cracking. Roll into a square about 8 inches wide and 12 inches long. Place the square on a sheet pan and chill for at least an hour.

For the tart:

Preheat the oven to 375°

Remove from the refrigerator. Fill the center of the tart dough with the apple slices, leaving about 1 inch of dough clear all around the outside of the rectangle. Fold this border up and over the apples, folding the dough together around the corners. Dot the apples with the butter, and sprinkle with a little salt.

Bake until the crust is golden brown and the fruit is tender, about 40 to 45 minutes. Remove from oven.

Mix the apricot jam, water and amaretto in a small saucepan and heat over medium heat until the jam has melted. Simmer until slightly thickened, then remove from heat and brush the glaze on the apple tart. Sprinkle with the crushed amaretti cookies and serve with almond ice cream.

Almond Ice Cream

Serves 8

Place the almonds on a baking sheet, and toast until browned. Allow to cool, then finely chop in a food processor.

Combine the cream and milk in a medium saucepan. Bring to a simmer over medium heat. Remove from heat and stir in the chopped almonds. Allow to sit for 2 hours.

In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs for 1-2 minutes. Slowly whisk in the sugar a little at a time. Continue to whisk until lighter and thicker, another minute. Whisk in the almond cream and chill for an hour.

Freeze in an ice cream freezer according to the instructions. Freeze for two hours. Serve with apple amaretti tart, or canned cherries in wine and dark chocolate.