This plum galette is as easy to make as it is stunning! I use my perfect flaky pie crust and fill it with fresh plums and toasted hazelnuts! Top with vanilla ice cream for the perfect summery dessert!
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What is a Galette?
A galette is a French pastry that’s essentially a free-form pie. Galettes can be sweet or savory but I'm partial to sweet fruit galettes! [Also called a crostata in Italian!]
The best thing about galettes vs traditional pies is that they're super easy to make and meant to look rustic and imperfect! To make a galette, you just make circles of pie dough, spoon your filling into the center, and fold the edges over to hold it together. That's it!
If you like this plum galette, you might also like this golden beet galette or this peach galette!
Ingredient Notes
You just need a few ingredients to make this simple plum galette!
Pastry Flour - I always use pastry flour in my pie crust because it yields a lighter, more tender crust. However, all purpose flour will work great if that's all you have!
Hazelnut Flour - Hazelnut flour is literally just finely ground hazelnuts! I love using it in place of some of the flour for an extra nutty flavor. But it's completely optional! You can buy hazelnut flour at a lot of grocery stores and online (Bob’s Red Mill is my favorite brand for nut flours).
Butter - The most important consideration for making pastry dough is cold butter!! If the butter gets too warm while you're making the dough, the crust won't be as flaky.
Plums - I always use fresh plums and I don't recommend substituting frozen! This galette would also be delicious with any other stone fruit! I actually used cherry plums for this galette and they were delicious. This galette would also be delightful with apricots.
Cornstarch - We use cornstarch to help thicken the filling, but you can also substitute flour or clear jel. This is a great guide for making those substitutions!
Toasted Hazelnuts - Plums and hazelnuts are a delicious combo! So I love adding the ground hazelnuts to the crust and topping with a few toasted nuts. But feel free to leave them out.
Almond Extract - This is optional, but I like adding a bit of almond extract to pair with the toasted hazelnuts.
Fresh Thyme - I love fresh thyme and plums together, but you could also use fresh mint or basil! Or just leave out the herbs all together and go for warming spices like cinnamon, cloves, or cardamom!
The complete list of ingredients and amounts is located in the recipe card below.
How to Make a Galette
For more tips and tricks on how to make perfect flaky pie crust, check out this post!
Cut butter into small cubes and place in the fridge to firm up while you get the rest of your ingredients together.
In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the flour, hazelnut flour, sugar, and salt. Add in the cold butter and use your hands to press it into the flour mixture until you get quarter sized crumbs.
Add cold water and combine until dough forms a nice ball but is still slightly sticky.
Take the formed ball of dough and shape into slightly flattened disk.
Wrap the disk in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. This is important to keep the butter from melting so that the crust will be nice and flaky. The chilled dough is also much easier to work with for rolling out.
You can also make the pie dough up to 2 days in advance and store in the fridge until ready to use!
Preheat your oven to 400°F.
Lightly flour a clean surface. Roll out dough to about ¼ inch thick and about 12 inches across. If you want a cleaner looking galette, you can use a knife to trim the edges of dough to make a perfect circle but it's not necessary.
Place the dough on a parchment lined baking sheet.
Gently toss together the sliced plums, lemon juice, almond extract, sugar, and cornstarch until evenly coated.
Arrange the plums on your pie dough, leaving about an inch around the edges. [I love doing a pretty flower design, but you can just pile them on if you prefer.]
Gently fold over the edges of the dough overlapping as you go.
Brush the edges lightly with egg wash and sprinkle with a little extra sugar, if desired.
Bake at 400°F for 20-25 minutes or until the filling is bubbling and the crust is golden brown.
Let cool for at least 10 minutes, then sprinkle with fresh thyme and toasted hazelnuts and serve with vanilla ice cream or homemade whipped cream.
While this rustic plum galette is delicious warm, the filling will set more as it cools.
This galette is best eaten the same day, but can be stored in the fridge for 2-3 days. You can serve it cold or warm it up in the oven at 350°F for about 5 minutes to crisp up the crust.
Tips for Flaky Pastries
Use cold ingredients! For most baked goods you want to use room temperature ingredients, but for flaky pastries (like scones, biscuits, or pie crust) the ingredients need to be very cold! Keep any butter, eggs, milk, etc. in the fridge until right before you need to use them!
Chill before baking! Chilling the dough for at least 15-20 minutes before baking helps ensure the butter in the dough is nice and cold and helps the pastries hold their shape. Cold dough + hot oven = perfect flaky pastry!
Don't overwork the dough! You want to mix the ingredients until just combined so that there are still distinct pieces of butter in the dough. This is what gives you those buttery, flaky, air pockets!
Measure your flour correctly! It's most accurate to use a kitchen scale, but if you're measuring by volume you want to spoon and level! Fluff up the flour a bit with a spoon, and then spoon flour into the measuring cup. Once it's overflowing, use the back of a knife to level it off. Don't ever pack flour into the measuring cup or you'll end up with way too much! Improperly measured flour can lead to dry, dense baked goods. [Measure cocoa powder the same way!]
Make sure you baking powder is fresh! Baking powder is important for helping certain baked goods rise properly, but it has a relatively short shelf life once opened, so it's one of the few items I never buy in bulk! To test if your baking powder is still fresh, add a small amount to boiling water. If it bubbles it's still good to use, but if not it's time to toss it!
Use an oven thermometer! Just because your oven says it's 350, doesn't mean it is! If you oven hasn't been calibrated recently, it can be as much as 30 degrees off, which will negatively affect all baked goods from cakes to macarons! An oven thermometer is the easiest/cheapest way to ensure your oven is always at the proper temperature. Some ovens also take longer than the standard "preheat" time to actually come up to the proper temperature.
Recipe FAQ's
Absolutely!! Any stone fruit (apricots, nectarines, cherries, etc.) can be substituted in the same quantities but other fruits might require a slightly different amount of cornstarch. Check out this guide for fruit to cornstarch ratios!
Chilling the dough helps hydrate the flour and ensures the plum galette will hold its shape when baked! Chilling the dough also makes it much easier to work with and roll out!
Adding cornstarch or flour is essential in making sure the juices from the plums congeal and don't get soupy! You can also brush the bottom of the crust with a little bit of egg white before adding the plums on top.
Tips for Success!
For best results I always recommend using weight measurements (especially when baking) because it's the most accurate. Kitchen scales are super affordable and also reduce the number of dishes you have to do! However, all my recipes also include US customary measurements for convince. Use this chart to convert measurements for common ingredients!
Substitutions: In all my recipes, I've included substitutions that I know will work, but I cannot guarantee results if you substitute ingredients that I have not recommended. [For example, granulated sugar and honey are indeed both sweeteners but they have very different properties so they can not always be swapped 1:1. Using honey in a cookie recipe that calls for granulated sugar will yield a giant mess.] In the recipe card you'll find links to the specific ingredients/brands that I use.
A note on salt: I almost exclusively use Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt because it's the best all-purpose salt for cooking and baking. If you're not using kosher salt, consult this handy guide for a conversion chart! When in doubt, if you're using table salt just reduce the amount by half for baked goods. When cooking, I prefer to under-salt because you can always add more! If you've over-salted, adding a little bit of acid (like lemon juice) can help.
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Recipe Card
Plum Galette
Special Equipment
Ingredients
Pie Crust
- 1 cup pastry flour, substitute all purpose flour
- 2 tablespoons hazelnut flour, optional
- 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold
- 2 tablespoons water, cold
- 1 egg, beaten for egg wash
Galette Filling
- 8 large plums, sliced (about 1 pound)
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- ¼ teaspoon almond extract
- 2 teaspoons fresh thyme
- 2 tablespoons toasted hazelnuts, chopped
Instructions
- Cut butter into small cubes and place in the fridge to firm up while you get the rest of your ingredients together.
- In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the flour, hazelnut flour, sugar, and salt. Add in the cold butter and use your hands to press it into the flour mixture until you get quarter sized crumbs.
- Add cold water and combine until dough forms a nice ball but is still slightly sticky.
- Take the formed ball of dough and shape into slightly flattened disk.
- Wrap the disk in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. This is important to keep the butter from melting so that the crust will be nice and flaky. The chilled dough is also much easier to work with for rolling out.
- You can also make the pie dough up to 2 days in advance and store in the fridge until ready to use!
- Preheat your oven to 400°F.
- Gently toss together the sliced plums, lemon juice, almond extract, sugar, and cornstarch until evenly coated.
- Lightly flour a clean surface. Roll out dough to about ¼ inch thick and about 12 inches across. If you want a cleaner looking galette, you can use a knife to trim the edges of dough to make a perfect circle but it's not necessary.
- Place the dough on a parchment lined baking sheet.
- Arrange the plums on your pie dough, leaving about an inch around the edges. [I love doing a pretty flower design, but you can just pile them on if you prefer.]
- Gently fold over the edges of the dough overlapping as you go.
- Brush the edges lightly with egg wash and sprinkle with a little extra sugar, if desired.
- Bake at 400°F for 20-25 minutes or until the filling is bubbling and the crust is golden brown.
- Let cool for at least 10 minutes, then sprinkle with fresh thyme and toasted hazelnuts and serve with vanilla ice cream or homemade whipped cream.
- While this rustic plum galette is delicious warm, the filling will set more as it cools.
Notes
Nutrition
The nutritional information on this website is only an estimate and is provided for convenience and as a courtesy only. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Amy Liu Dong says
Wow! It looks delicious and a perfect to pair with tea or coffee.