With Valentine’s Day in mind, Seasoned shares a delicious dessert recipe devised with baking chef Brendan Lynch, finalist of BBC’s Great British Bake Off 2012

Makes 24cm tart

Ingredients

3 medium British apples

Apricot glaze*

For pâté brisée pastry:

170g plain flour

100g soft butter, diced

1tsp castor sugar

3/4tsp salt

1 medium egg

Cold milk

Egg white

For the almond filling:

62g unsalted butter

45g castor sugar

32g ground almonds

1/2tsp all-purpose flour

1/4tsp cornflour

1 small egg

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Method

For the pastry. Mix flour, salt, and castor sugar together in a medium-sized bowl. Rub butter into the flour so it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg and just enough milk to form a soft/firm dough. Knead for a minute, shape into a ball and put on a plate. Cover with clingfilm and leave to rest for 20 mins in the fridge.

Grease a 24cm tart tin and roll out the pastry to the thickness of a £1 coin. Place in tin and press into sides with a small ball of dough. Leave a 1 inch overhang of pastry and remove the rest with scissors. Line the pastry with non-stick parchment paper so that it protects beyond the pastry. Fill to almost the top with rice or beans ensuring that the sides are supported by the dry material. Place in fridge for 20 minutes.

Preheat oven to 180°C and have egg white ready to seal the pastry before the second part bake. Bake pastry for 12 minutes. Use parchment to help you remove it from the oven and lift the dry contents away from the pastry shell. Prick the base all over with a fork to reduce puffing up and brush pastry shell with egg white. Return to oven and bake for 8–10 minutes. Cool on a rack.

For the apple filling, peel and quarter the apples and remove core with seeds. Slice the quarters thinly. If they begin to oxidise, place in a bowl of water with juice of 1/2 lemon to prevent discolouration (pat dry before putting on top of tart).

Preheat oven to 180°C. For the almond cream filling, put the butter and castor sugar in a bowl and using a hand-held whisk beat the mixture until smooth, light and satiny (around 3-4 minutes). Add the ground almonds and blend. Add the flour and corn flour mixture, whisk again, and then add the egg. Whisk for about 15 seconds more, or until the almond cream is homogeneous. Add vanilla and whisk to blend.

Spread the mixture over the pastry-case base and smooth with a small spatula. Starting with the outside circle, place overlapping slices of apple all the way round, covering the cream beneath. Repeat until you reach the inner circle. Complete the same way or alternatively, stand each slice at a 35 degree angle to form a pattern in the centre. Sprinkle with a little castor sugar.

Bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes until apples are soft. If the pastry is in danger of burning, put a collar of tinfoil round the edge to protect it.

To finish, remove from the oven and brush apple slices with warm apricot glaze, allowing to cool and set before serving.

*To make apricot glaze, mix half a jar of apricot preserve with 1tbsp water. Heat gently until dissolved and then push through a sieve to remove fruit pieces.

Seasoned Cookery School

Seasoned Cookery School is situated in the beautiful Catton Hall Estate in South Derbyshire. Offering over 20 different courses with a range of fun and friendly chefs, the Seasoned ethos is to inspire people with food. They also offer private dining for groups of 12-24.

Brendan teaches five different baking courses at Seasoned, including ‘Chocolate Baking’ on 14th February. Visit seasonedcourses.com or call 01283 810275.