Recipe no. 454 from Jean-Baptiste Reboul's La Cuisinière provençale (1909), page 209.
Ingredients
- Blanched, dried almonds, 250 grams
- Lump sugar, 250 grams
- Whole eggs, 6
- Softened butter, 150 grams
- Orange flower water
- Puff pastry
Preparation
- Pounding the almonds and sugarPound in a mortar 250 grams of blanched, dried almonds, among which a few bitter ones, with 250 grams of lump sugar. Start by pounding all the almonds with a quarter of the given amount of sugar; pass through a sieve; put back in the mortar what has not gone through with another quarter of sugar, and so on until it has all gone through.
- Working in eggs and butterPut it all back in the mortar to work in 6 whole eggs then 150 grams of softened butter, and flavour with a tablespoon of orange flower water.
- Lining and baking the tartYou will have prepared a puff pastry from which you will make two sheets the size of the cake you want to obtain; put one on a tart tin, put in the middle the prepared almond cream, spreading it with a knife to within 3 centimetres of the edge; moisten the uncovered part of the dough; apply the second sheet over it all and press on the edges to seal them together; glaze with egg and bake in a hot oven.
Reboul's text
Pound in a mortar 250 grams of blanched, dried almonds, among which a few bitter ones, with 250 grams of lump sugar. Start by pounding all the almonds with a quarter of the given amount of sugar; pass through a sieve; put back in the mortar what has not gone through with another quarter of sugar, and so on until it has all gone through.
Put it all back in the mortar to work in 6 whole eggs then 150 grams of softened butter, and flavour with a tablespoon of orange flower water.
You will have prepared a puff pastry from which you will make two sheets the size of the cake you want to obtain; put one on a tart tin, put in the middle the prepared almond cream, spreading it with a knife to within 3 centimetres of the edge; moisten the uncovered part of the dough; apply the second sheet over it all and press on the edges to seal them together; glaze with egg and bake in a hot oven.
Small Provençal glossary for this recipe
Reboul writes in French: no Provençal word appears in this recipe, apart from the dish's name itself. The table below gives the Provençal equivalents of the words used, in mistralian spelling, translated by Lingua Nostra. Each form is attested in our Provençal-English dictionary; click to open the entry.
| Provençal | English |
|---|---|
| sucre | sugar |
| iòu | eggs |
| burre | butter |
| arangié | orange |
| past | puff pastry |
| tourtiero | tart tin |
| coutèu | knife |
| four | oven |
Source: Jean-Baptiste Reboul, La Cuisinière provençale, Marseille, 1909, recipe no. 454, page 209. Public domain. Transcription, formatting and Provençal glossary by Lingua Nostra.