French Tart Dough

The brown butter mixture, directly from the oven.


After the flower has been stirred in, do not mix by hand.

Prick the dough several times with a fork, and bring the dough further up the pan than I did.

Notice the small hole in the baked crust in the upper left hand corner,
this is why you reserve a small piece of raw dough.


Personally I think this is the easiest crust I've ever made. Just be careful because the butter mixture will be very hot, so be sure to have a potholder nearby, and use caution when handling the dough.

French Tart Dough: www.davidlebovitz.com

Ingredients:
8 T unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 ¼ tablespoon vegetable oil (I used canola)
3 T + 2 ¼ tsp water
1 + ¾ tsp sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
187.5 g all purpose flour

Preheat the oven to 410º F (210º C).

Directions:
1. In a medium-sized ovenproof bowl, such as a Pyrex bowl, combine the butter, oil, water, sugar, and salt.
2. Place the bowl in the oven for 15 minutes, until the butter is bubbling and starts to brown just around the edges.
3. When done, remove the bowl from oven (and be careful, since the bowl will be hot and the mixture might sputter a bit), dump in the flour and stir it in quickly, until it comes together and forms a ball which pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
4. Lightly butter the tart pan (bottom and sides)
5. Transfer the dough to an 11-inch tart mold with a removable bottom and spread it a bit with a spatula.
6. Once the dough is cool enough to handle, pat it into the shell with your and, and use your fingers to press it up the sides of the tart mold. Reserve a small piece of dough, about the size of a raspberry, for patching any cracks.
7. Prick the dough all over with the tines of a fork, then bake the tart shell in the oven for 15 minutes, or until the dough is golden brown.
8. Remove from the oven and if there are any sizable cracks, use the bits of reserved dough to fill in and patch them.
9. Let the shell cool before filling.