Every January the French cheerfully eat their galettes des rois.  It’s usually served up on the 6th of January to celebrate the Epiphany, or the first Sunday that follows it, but now it’s around ALL month!  Hurray!  Because if someone gets the litttle trinquet (fêve) hidden in the galette, they become royalty for the day and the king or queen wears the crown which comes with the galette; however, if you get the bean, you have to pay for that galette or get the next one, which means a family or group of friends could be eating a string of galettes for a month!  Now, if you’re going to tuck into a constant supply of galettes or even just the one, I strongly recommend making this raspberry, lychee and rose Galette Ispahan.   Based on the recipe by Pierre Hermé in his classic Ispahan book, it is simply amazing.  It’s light, moist, juicy, fruity and very very moreish.

The traditional galette filling is a frangipane (almond paste with pastry cream), which is delicious but can be a tiny bit heavy.  Our lovely galette (or pithiviers, purists might say) also involves puff pastry but it’s filled with a simpler almond paste mixed with a little rose-flavoured cream then studded with lychees and loads of fresh raspberries.  It’s the first galette I’ve had that I couldn’t stop eating.  

I couldn’t find my small sharp knife, so the lines decorating it aren’t great but it was oh so moist and delicious.  Yum yum.  It’s worth hunting down the rose syrup.

Seriously, it’s so good I’m thinking of making it in February too, and the rest of the year.

Here’s a second prototype, which was just as incredibly yummy!  I had finally found another small sharp knife at the bottom of my drawer and carved lots of lines, giving the galette that trendy woollen ball look.

RECIPE – for a 20cm/8in galette for 6 to 8 people (for a larger 28cm/11in diametre galette, double all the quantities – 900g pastry, etc)

Preparation the previous night

• Cut the 100g lychees, each one into 6 slices, then place in a sieve over a bowl to drain overnight in the fridge.
• Find two small plates or cake rings – one with a 20cm/7.9in diametre, the other with a 21cm/8.3in diametre
• If making your own puff pastry do the first two turns (and the last turn the next day, at least 2 hours before making the galette)

Ingredients

420 to 450g good-quality puff pastry, preferably all-butter – I used homemade inverted puff pastry – see recipe here.  

Filling

• 100g/3.5oz canned lychees (drained overnight to about 60g/2.1oz)
• 62g/1/4 cup butter, good-quality and softened at room temperature
• 62g/1/2 cup icing sugar (powdered/confectioner’s sugar)
• 62g/2/3 cup ground almonds
• 37g beaten egg at room temperature (about 3/4 of a medium/large egg)
• 8g/1 tablespoon unsweetened custard powder (or cornflour like Maizena)
• 25g/ml fresh cream
• 2 to 3g/1/2 teaspoon rose water
• 12g/2/3 tbsp rose syrup (like Monin) – there are recipes online for a homemade version (it’s not the same as rose water – it’s a sweet cordial you can use for drinks/cocktails)
• 125g/4.4oz fresh raspberries
• A little beaten egg with 1 tsp cream (note:  I didn’t use red colouring for the glaze, as in Hermé’s original recipe, as my colouring powder made my beaten egg too liquid and runny)

Glaze (optional)

• 10g water
• 10g sugar

Method

1. Roll out 1/2 puff pastry on a sheet of baking paper to 2-3 mm thick – keep lifting and moving the pastry around between rolls so that the pastry is relaxed and shrinks naturally between rolls.  Cut around a plate/cake ring with a small sharp knife to get one 20cm-diametre pastry round  then repeat with other 1/2 pastry to get one 21cm pastry round.  Keep the pastry rounds on the baking paper they were rolled on – cut the paper around them and place rounds (and paper) on a large baking tray.  Place in fridge to chill 1 hour.   Doing all this means our pastry rounds will be easy to handle when assembling and won’t later shrink or become oval in shape.
2. Prepare the almond cream.  Use a rubber spatula to stir the softened butter until the texture of hair cream.  Gradually stir in first the icing sugar, then the ground almonds, then the beaten egg, stirring to combine between each addition. Then add the custard powder and stir, then the cream, then the rose water and rose syrup.  Stir until just combined.
3. Brush lightly with water around the smaller pastry round, on a 2cm wide border). Option 1:  using a 12cm nozzle and piping bag, pipe all the almond cream in a swirl on the smaller 20cm pastry round, leaving the 2cm-wide border uncovered around the cream.  Stud almond cream with the raspberries at regular intervals then place the drained lychee pieces between the raspberries. Insert your little fêve in the fruit, near the outer border, so there’s less chance of cutting into it when serving.  Add a bean elsewhere too, if you like.  Option 2 (if you want to turn the galette upside down for a neater effect, as many French pâtissiers do – the fruit seemed better centred when I used this option but for some reason, maybe it was the pastry, the galette didn’t rise as much):  Only pipe and spread a thin layer of almond cream on the smaller round, leaving the 2cm-wide border uncovered around the cream.  Stud with the raspberries and lychees then insert the fêve (and optional bean), as above. Then pipe a thicker layer of almond cream over these. Spread the cream to a relatively smooth surface (last photo).
4. For both options:  now cover with larger pastry round and use side of your hand to gently press sides of the 2 rounds together.  Try to make sure there is no air left inside the pastry around the filling.  Chill in fridge 30 minutes. 
5. Press your index finger lightly on the side and with the back of a small sharp knife cut pastry on the right of your finger and inwards about 1cm to make a scallop shape.  Continue all the way around.  This helps seal the pastry and can also help create a nice design.
6. If following option 1, brush with beaten egg.  If following option 2, cover the galette with a round of baking paper and carefully turn upside down onto the baking tray.  Then brush the smaller round (now on top) with beaten egg.  For both options try to keep a 1-2 cm border free of beaten egg, to avoid having the sides stick together and not rise so well. Chill galette 20 mins in the fridge.
7. With a small sharp knife, poke a little hole in the middle of the galette.  Then lightly carve curving lines around the galette, going from the hole to the outside without cutting through the pastry.  If you carve thinner lines, you’ll get that woollen ball effect. You can also find other decorating patterns to follow on the internet.
8. Place the galette, still on the baking tray, back in the fridge to chill a further 2 hours.
9. Pre-heat oven to 230ºC fan oven (250ºC static oven).
10. When oven reaches 230°C (250°C static), place galette on baking tray in the oven.  Immediately lower temperature to 180ºC fan oven (200ºC static oven).
11. Bake 40 to 50 minutes, until nicely golden brown so that all the pastry looks cooked (unbaked pastry is yukky).
12. Optional glaze (my 2nd ‘woolley’ galette had no glaze but the glaze on the 1st galette seemed to help keep the pastry crispy for longer):  while galette is baking, heat the 10g sugar and 10g water in a small saucepan on low heat until sugar dissolves.  Bring to the boil and allow to cool a little.  When galette is out of the oven, after 5 mins brush the top with the glaze to make it shiny.  

Allow to cool 30 minutes or more on a wire rack before serving.

Eating and storing your Galette Ispahan

The galette can be eaten warm or cold.  It’s best eaten on the same day.  However, wrapped in aluminium foil, loosely but well-sealed (then also placed in airtight tupperware), it can be stored at cool room temperature for up to 3 days – the pastry will soften but the galette will still be delicious, especially if you’ve used homemade inverted puff pastry.

I really recommend this Galette Ispahan with its amazing flavours and textures.  Even in Hermé’s book the galette doesn’t look like it’s risen dramatically high, but who cares! 🙂  The taste is mind-blowing.

Happy King’s Day or month!  Or year! 🙂

Have a lovely 2024 dear reader!  Wishing you lots of amazing baking and eating! 🙂 Lili x