Strawberry Rhubarb Galette
This rustic take on a classic Strawberry Rhubarb Pie features a flaky, golden pie dough that is rustically folded over a simple to make strawberry rhubarb filling. This delicious filling features fresh strawberries, rhubarb, orange zest, and elderflower liqueur for a nice floral summery-touch! Easy to make, gorgeous to look at, and an absolute delight to eat! Enjoy slightly warm with ice cream!
WHAT IS A GALETTE?
A Galette is a French dessert that is made from a free-form crust. More simply, galettes are essentially pies, but they do not require a pie dish, a tart pan, or really any sort of pan except for a baking sheet. They are made from, as mentioned above, a free-form pie crust – meaning that you basically just roll the pie dough out into a general circle shape, place the filling into the centre, then fold the edges up, and bake! So incredibly simple and easy! Plus, they’re absolutely beautiful-looking!
HOW TO MAKE THE PERFECT PIE DOUGH
To make the perfect pie dough for this Strawberry Rhubarb Galette should produce a crust that is flaky, tender, buttery, and delicately sweet. In order to achieve this, a few ingredients are needed, as well as proper technique.
THE INGREDIENTS
To create the pie dough, cold butter and cold water are absolute musts. Similar to making scones or biscuits, the reason the butter needs to be cold is so that once it hits the hot oven, the water within the butter quickly evaporates, leaving behind little air pockets. These little air pockets are what creates that flaky texture! The reason for the cold liquid is so that it doesn’t warm up the other ingredients, like the butter.
Another ingredient that I use in my pie doughs is vodka. Yes you heard me right – vodka! By using vodka, instead of water, it helps to inhibit gluten formation, and as we know, too much gluten = a tough final product! The reason for this is because water activates gluten, so by replacing the water with vodka it reduces the water content by 40% (vodka is 60% water, 40% ethanol). However, you need to be careful not to add too much vodka, as it may effect the flavor. Therefore, I like to use a 50% water and 50% vodka mix!
THE TECHNIQUE
The key to perfect pie dough is to handle it as little as possible. Handling the dough too much can result in the butter melting, which will create a dense dough. As well, over handling the dough by kneading it too much will result in excess gluten formation, and a subsequent tough dough. It is important to only knead the dough until it forms a shaggy dough. After a shaggy dough comes together, press it into a disk shape as best as you can and place it into plastic wrap, and then into the fridge for an hour. After an hour, remove the dough, let it warm up slightly on the counter for 5 minutes, then begin rolling it out!
Filling Ingredients
Strawberries: The sweet, summer berry is 1/2 of the main parts of the filling – try to find juicy, ripe, and bright red strawberries for the best flavor!
Rhubarb: Rhubarb is a sour vegetable that has a texture similar to celery and a taste similar to sour apples. Rhubarb makes for an excellent contrast to the sweet strawberries! I prefer to use the thinner rhubarb stalk, however if you can only find the large, wide ones just split them in half lengthwise.
Sugar: Obviously sugar acts as a sweetener in this Strawberry Rhubarb Galette!
Elder Flower Liqueur: The elder flower liqueur adds a beautifully floral touch to the galette. If you do not have elder flower liqueur, feel free to just omit it.
Orange Zest: The citrus zest works to brighten up the galette. Use lemon zest if you do not have any oranges.
Corn Starch: Corn Starch is extremely important in this galette recipe – it acts as the thickener for the filling! As the filling cooks, the strawberries release all their inner juices. These juices then mix with the corn starch and gel together to thicken into a jammy-sauce! Without corn starch, this Strawberry Rhubarb Galette would just be a soppy mess.
ROLLING, FILLING, & FOLDING THE STRAWBERRY RHUBARB GALETTE
Rolling out the pie dough for the Strawberry Rhubarb Galette is super easy – I swear! It does not need to be rolled out into a perfect circle, like with pie dough does. In fact, the more rustic looking the dough is, the better! Roll the dough out into a general circle or sq-oval shape, about 1/8 – 1/4″ thick.
Filling the Strawberry Rhubarb Galette is a little bit different than filling a typical Pie. With Pie, you typically pile the filling sky-high, so that you can have a nice thick slice of pie. With galettes, it’s a different story. You want to aim to have a rather flat and compact filling – otherwise the galette tends to get mushy. So, as a general rule, try to keep the filling as flat as possible, and leave about a 2-3” border around the edges, so you can properly fold the edges over.
Folding the Galette is also very straight forward. Essentially fold the edges up, over, and on top of the filling, overlapping the folds until it is completely folded.
Get the Recipe: Strawberry Rhubarb Galette
Ingredients
Pie Dough
- 2 cup (240g) All Purpose Flour,, measured correctly †
- 1/4 cup White Sugar
- Pinch of Salt
- 1 cup Unsalted Butter,, cubed and very cold
- 4 tbsp Ice Cold Water,, plus more if needed
- 4 tbsp Cold Vodka
Strawberry Rhubarb Filling
- 2 cups Quartered Strawberries
- 2 cups Chopped Rhubarb,, chopped into 1/2″ slices
- 1/2 cup White Sugar
- 1 ½ tbsp Elder Flower Liqueur
- Zest of 1 Orange
- 1/4 cup Corn Starch
Instructions
Making the Strawberry Rhubarb Galette Pie Dough
- Mix together vodka and water into a small measuring cup, then set aside. In a large mixing bowl, add flour, sugar, and salt. Whisk to combine. Add in cold butter cubes, and work the butter into flour with your hands or a pastry cutter. Work the butter until it is crumbly and about the size of peas.
- Slowly drizzle in vodka-water while simultaneously tossing with a fork to combine. After all the vodka-water has been added, knead the dough a few times inside the bowl until a shaggy dough forms. If the dough doesn’t come together, slowly add more water until a shaggy dough forms.
- Form dough, as best as you can, into a disk shape, then place into a freezer bag, then into the fridge for an hour to chill.
- Remove dough from fridge and place onto counter for 5 minute to warm-up a bit. Remove the dough from the freezer bag and place onto a well-floured work surface.
- Roll dough out to be about 1/4” thick, and about 13-14” in diameter, aiming for a general circle shape (however it does not need to be perfect). Place rolled out dough onto a parchment-lined baking sheet.
Filling & Baking the Strawberry Rhubarb Galette
- Preheat oven to 375°F. In a medium bowl, combine all filling ingredients until well combined.
- Spread the filling onto the center of the rolled out pie dough, leaving a 2″ border around the edges.
- Gently fold the bare edge of the dough over the filling, overlapping the dough as necessary. Press gently to seal the edges.
- In a small dish, whisk together the egg and water until frothy and combined. Brush this egg wash across the edges of the galette, then sprinkle with turbinado sugar.
- Place the Strawberry Rhubarb Galette into the oven, bake for 35 minutes. Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.
