Les Poissonchats

Nusstorte is a pie very typical for where I come from and my grandmother, whom we all called Nani, used to make this for coffee or as a dessert. It’s a mixture of walnuts, sugar, honey, eggs and cream baked in velvety buttercrust pastry. The secret is to take your time, stir well and let the pastry sit before processing. This tarte is baked the old farmer’s wife way, which is at rather a low temperature and for a long time, a tribute to good old stovepipe cooking.

For the dough: Take 250g spelt flour (T80), 50g of sugar, 100g of fresh butter, a pinch of salt, half a teaspoon of baking powder and a drizzle of milk and prepare a silky dough. Take care to work as swiftly as possible as the butter should not melt but rather amalgamate with the flour. Let the dough sit in a cool spot for an hour.

For the filling: Take 150g of sugar, 50g of honey and 2 eggs and stir well until creamy. Add 75ml of whole cream and a dash of grated lemon zest, keep on stirring and add 250g of broken walnuts.

Butter a flat tarte mould and roll out 2/3 of the dough to about 3mm. Carefully lay out the mould and add the walnut filling. Roll out the remaining dough, again to about 3mm and cover the mixture. Be sure to press the rim, so that the filling won’t spill while baking.

Heat two large spoons of honey until it’s well liquid and carefully coat the tarte with it. Punch a couple of holes into the cover so that the tarte won’t produce any volcanic eruptions while baking.

Bake at 160°C no fan for about an hour and let cool in the mould. Enjoy with a dollop of double cream and a little glass of pear liqueur.