Date and Frangipane Tart

I love dates - they are lollies from a tree. When I saw Neil Perry's recipe for a date and frangipane tart, I was immediately on to it - delish!

This tart combines dates boiled in brandy and apple juice with plum jam and frangipane.  I wasn't a fan of the pastry recipe (Dorie Greenspan's is better), but if I made it again, I would just use Dorie's recipe for the pie crust.

If you are a fan of dates and would like to try this tart, the recipe is as follows:

Dates

250ml apple juice
125ml brandy
12 halved fresh dates, seeded
150g plum jam icing sugar, to dust
300ml thickened cream, whipped to serve

Pastry

250g plain flour
70g butter, softened
pinch of salt
90g icing sugar, sifted
60ml milk
2 egg yolks

Frangipane

125g butter, softened
125g icing sugar, sifted
3 eggs
125g almond meal
25g plain flour

Pastry

Put the flour, butter, salt and icing sugar in a food processor and process until they have a fine breadcrumb like texture. Add the milk and egg yolks and process into a dough.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured bench and knead before forming into a ball, wrapping in plastic wrap and chilling in the fridge for 1 hour.

Spray a 24cm round pie dish with cooking oil. Roll out the pastry on a floured bench to a thickness of 3mm. Line the pie dish with the pastry, cut off the excess, prick the base with a fork, and allow the crust to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Preheat your oven to 180C. Line the pie crust with alfoil sprayed with oil on one side (oil side down), fill with rice and blind bake for 20-25 minutes. Remove rice and baking paper and return the pie crust to the oven and bake for a further 5-10 minutes.

Put the apple juice and brandy in a saucepan, bring to the boil, then add dates and simmer, uncovered, for 2 minutes. Drain the dates and set aside, reserving the liquid.  Set aside 25ml of the liquid, then reduce the remaining liquid in a saucepan over medium high heat until syrupy, about 6 minutes. Set aside to cool.

To make the frangipane, beat the butter in a stand mixer until light and creamy. Add the sugar and mix until well combined. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Stir through the almond meal, flour and 25ml reserved liquid and mix well. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Preheat your oven to 180C. Spread the plum jam over the base of the tart shell, top with the drained dates and gently spoon enough of the filling over the jam and dates to cover. Bake for 35-40 minutes. Cool until just warm, dust with icing sugar.

Serve the tart with icecream and drizzled with reduced apple-brandy liquid.