Tarte Tatin 101
A sweet and savory French classic
There are certain iconic French dishes and the tarte tatin is without a doubt one of them. Although the apple tatin is the most commonplace, I’d argue that the savory ones are the real gems. My personal favorite is my family’s Shallot Tarte Tatin - the recipe will be in TCB USA but I’ve convinced my publisher to share it here with you today!
I just spent Easter back home in France at the Mills and made a few iterations of a carrot tarte tatin for the holiday. Honestly, each one was as delicious as the next and it reminded me of how much I love this kind of bake. It’s relatively easy to make and such a show stopper for dinner parties. Whether you make them sweet or savory, it’s up to you!
Paris city guide here for all my euro summer readers!
What is a Tarte Tatin?
Think of it as an upside down pie? It’s cooked upside down and eaten right side up. You bake the filling with a layer of pie dough on top and then flip it over once it’s baked to reveal a (hopefully) glossy, glazed, and delectable tarte. It’s similar to a pineapple upside down cake but with pie crust layered on top rather than cake batter poured on top and then flipped.
Traditionally, one would use a copper mold to bake an apple tarte tatin. The bottom was slathered in butter, sugar, and then covered with nice big chunks of sugared apples, only to be topped with a thin pâte brisée. Finally, it was flipped and served warm. Today, there are so many iterations, each dependent on the chef preparing the bake.
The Dough
When making a tarte tatin, the most common dough is a pâte brisée (flour + butter + water) but some people like to make it with a pâte feuilletée (puff pastry), a pâte sablée (extra rich in butter) or a pâte sucrée (flour + butter + egg + sugar). While pâte sucrée, sweet shortcrust, can be used to make tarte tatin, since I like making quiches, fruit tartes, and savory tatins, I always stick with pâte brisée because it’s what I have on hand! I always make big batches of this unsweetened dough to freeze and have ready for whenever I’m having friends over. Honestly, it doesn’t really matter what dough you choose to use, just make sure your filling is spot on and shiny!
All French families have their specific dough recipe - I can’t believe my publisher convinced me to share mine with you in the US version of The Condiment Book (and on today’s shallot tatin recipe newsletter) - which can be used in any and all tartes including tarte tatin. Although you can totally make a tatin using store-bought dough, I personally believe that a tried and tested homemade pâte brisée always makes more of a statement: your loved ones will be happy and so will your tastebuds!
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The History
Yeessss it’s finally time to dive into the history of the tarte tatin. If you’re anything like me, understanding where the dish in front of you comes from adds to the overall satisfaction level when you finally bite into it.
Meet Stéphanie et Caroline Tatin, two sisters working at their parents’ hotel - La Maison Tatin - from 1894-1906 in Lamotte-Beuvron. The eldest daughter, Caroline, handled guest services whilst her little sister Stéphanie was in charge of cooking for the clientele. She was known specifically for her caramelized apple pie. You can still visit, eat, and stay at La Maison Tatin today!
As all great culinary inventions, legend has it that the Tarte Tatin was born out of MISTAKE. Supposedly, Stéphanie Tatin would have forgotten to add the pie dough to the bottom of the tarte so she opted to add it on top instead? Another version of the legend goes that she actually dropped it when grabbing it from the oven so she just flipped it upside down and served it that way?? While these two stories are wonderful, the method was simply the way to make a regional specialty apple or pear pie from their region of Sologne. This way of cooking an “apple pie” had been around for ages and commonly passed down from mother to daughter but only popularized in the Tatin’s family hotel.
If you’re familiar with Paris, you most likely have heard of Maxim’s… This restaurant is iconic and now well known for their tarte tatin. Legend has it (yes, another one), that the head chef snuck into the La Maison Tatin kitchen one day to steal the recipe!! DRAMA!
Although this didn’t happen, the real drama is honestly just as good of a story. Louis Vaudable, the owner of Maxim’s, was served a tarte tatin during a hunting lunch and immediately fell in love with the dessert - as most of us do upon first bite of the buttery, apple, rich, crispy pie (brb drooling). He asked for the recipes, received a polite “nope / no way / no you’re not ever getting this recipe”, and so he sent one of his party chefs to the hotel instead to go UNDERCOVER. This patissier pretended to be a gardener looking for work and managed to spot the tatin methodology… Although this was not chill for many reasons, at least they named it the “tarte des demoiselles Tatin” once placed on the Paris restaurant’s menu.
Here’s the thing, the girls just KNEW what they were doing and the tarte tatin became so popular that a famous food critic named Maurice Curnonsky wrote about it. Known as the “prince des gastronomes”, the gastronomic prince, he published a piece about the tarte tatin where he shared the recipe and the rest is history. The dessert took off in Paris and throughout the rest of France
Apparently Maurice Curnonsky also started the rumor that the tarte tatin was born out of mistake. I guess any press was good press even then..?
Due to the success of the tarte tatin, the Michelin Guide included La Maison Tatin as one of the best restaurants in the Sologne region in the first ever edition of the guide. Pop off Stéphanie et Caroline Tatin!
If you liked learning about tarte tatin and want to try making your own, my Shallot Tarte Tatin recipe as well as my pâte brisée pie dough recipe can be found here.
For more recipes like this, preorder The Condiment Book 2.0 because I include loads of easy French classics I make at home regularly!
Love this! Reminds me of the Lemon Shaker Pie recipe I adapted from L.A. restaurant Gjelina for easy home baking.
check it out:
https://thesecretingredient.substack.com/p/gjelinas-lemon-shaker-pie