The Normandy Tarte Tatin

Legend has it that sisters Stéphanie and Caroline Tatin, two spinsters working at the Hotel Tatin in the Lamotte-Beuvron area (west of Paris), created the dish. While making an apple tart, Stéphanie accidentally forgot to place the pasty dough first; she nevertheless decided to put the dough on top of the apples, cooked it, and then flipped it! That is how the dessert got its original name: Tarte renversée des demoiselles Tatin (the Ms Tatins upside-down pie). In reality, the area in which the sisters lived was actually already famous for making upside-down style cakes, and a version of this apple dessert already existed before the Tatin sisters supposedly invented it in the 20th century. The sisters probably took a pre-existing recipe and altered it into what we know today: caramelized apples with a crisp pastry dough. The dessert became famous when Maxim’s, a famous Parisian restaurant, added it to their menu. Tarte Tatin should be served warm with a side of cream (usually, crème fraîche).