Spiced Wine + Plum Tarte Tatin

*Deep purple plums baked into flaky homemade puff pastry are glazed with a cinnamon and vanilla spiced wine syrup in this seasonal and warming Spiced Wine + Plum Tarte Tatin.

This blog is becoming something of a confessional, I’m realizing. So for today’s installment of “what weird tidbit of random (although highly applicable) information does Kayley plan on dishing up today?”, I give you this:

I don’t like plums.

I know! What the shnickeys is wrong with me?!

First apricots, now plums? It’s like I have some sort of vendetta against the stone fruit family, except for that I don’t. I just have this weird textural issue that prevents me from enjoying fruit with mush-like tendencies. Plums fall into that category for me and despite their lovely tart-sweet flavor, I just can’t move past their grainy-ness.

Well, that is, until I started into this un-checked obsession with tarte tatin.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this classic French dessert, a tarte tatin consists of a caramel made in an oven-safe pan (I like cast iron skillets), topped with slices of fruit which are cooked in the caramel, covered in a layer of puff pastry, baked, and then inverted. The cooked fruit is now on top, crispy, flaky pastry on the bottom, with caramel sauce oozing all over the place (in a contained area, of course).

After I had made an apple tarte tatin, then a pear tarte tatin, I started to look at all the season plums, constantly popping into my line of vision. Maybe cooked they would make a nice, colorful version of this magical dessert I had stumbled upon.

So I whipped one up and topped it with a sweet and tangy red wine syrup, accented with cinnamon and cloves.

Plums + wine + spices?

Mmmmmmm, good.

Spiced Wine + Plum Tarte Tatin

Serves: One 12" Tart

Ingredients

FOR THE PUFF PASTRY:
1⅔ cup Flour
¼ teaspoon Salt
8 ounces Grass-fed Butter, cold
½ cup Ice cold Water
extra flour for dusting
FOR THE PLUM TOPPING:
½ cup Fine Raw Cane Sugar
6 tablespoons Grass-fed Butter
6 Purple Plums (on the smaller side), quartered, pointed end cut off so that the top of the plum is more flat.
⅓ cup Red Wine
FOR THE SPICED WINE GLAZE:
1 cup Red Wine
⅓ cup Turbinado or Raw Cane Sugar
1 Vanilla Bean, sliced lengthwise
1 teaspoon Cinnamon
¼ teaspoon Cloves

Instructions

FOR THE PUFF PASTRY:
Place the flour and salt in a mixing bowl and whisk together. Cut the cold butter into small cubes and toss into the flour. Using a pastry cutter or two butter knives, slice the butter into the flour until it is pea-sized. Make a well in the center of the mixture and pour in the water. Mix together lightly to form a dough. Turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface and pat into the shape of a rectangle. Flour the top lightly and roll out to about half the thickness (the first part of this process will be a bit messy). Using a bench scraper, scrape under the top third of the rectangle and fold it over on top of the dough rectangle. Do the same thing with the bottom third of the dough so that you have formed a rectangle with three layers that is now laying horizontally. Turn the rectangle so that it is facing you vertically again and repeat the process of rolling, scraping, and turning, until you have done it about 10 times (use as much flour as is needed to keep the dough from sticking to the rolling pin and counter, but not so much that it becomes dry). At this point you will have developed several flaky layers of pastry. Butter smears should be visible in the dough (this is where the flaky-ness comes from.
Place the dough on a sheet of parchment paper (flour lightly) and roll into a 12½" wide circle. Place in the fridge.
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
FOR THE PLUM TOPPING:
Heat a 12" cast iron skillet on medium/high heat. Spinkle the cane sugar evenly over the bottom of the pan. The sugar will begin to liquify and caramelize. If it is not caramelizing evenly, use a silicone spatula to stir it. Once the sugar has evenly caramelized to a medium amber brown, add the butter (I fine that it is best to cut into 6, 1 tablespoon cubes, and place the cubes evenly around the bottom of the pan. Let the butter and caramel combine, stirring as needed, until the mixture is evenly combined and somewhat foamy. Pour in the wine and let cook for about 30 seconds, stirring to help combine. Remove pan from heat. Place plums quarters, skin side down, evenly around the tart in 2-3 layers.
Remove the pastry from the fridge and place the circle of dough on top of the plums, tucking the edges of the dough down in between the ends of the plums and the side of the pan.
Bake in the preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, or until the pastry on top of the pan is golden brown. Make glaze while tart is baking. When tart is finished, remove from oven and VERY CAREFULLY invert onto a serving dish (take care to avoid hot caramel running onto your hands!).
FOR THE SPICED WINE GLAZE:
Place the wine, sugar, vanilla bean, cinnamon, and cloves in a saucepan and bring to a boil over medium/high heat. Reduce heat to medium and simmer for 5-7 minutes, or until liquid is reduced by half. Let cool slightly.
Pour evenly tart after removing from oven.
Serve tart warm with vanilla ice cream.