Doornikse appeltaart

Regula says: 'I discovered this recipe for apple pie connected to the city of Doornik (Tournai) in a cookery manuscript from Ghent; it was then copied into the Cocboeck published in 1593 by Carolus Battus, who also shared a recipe for an apple pie ‘in the Wallon fashion’. Both these recipes in their turn were then reproduced in De Verstandigen Kock (The Clever Cook), which was published first in Amsterdam in 1667, but had several editions published in Antwerp, and editions in Ghent and Brussels. This cookbook travelled to America with many settlers from the Low Countries in the seventeenth century, as is shown by the many copies held in libraries there.'

'Although today Doornik is a Walloon town not far from the French border, in the fifth century it was the capital of the Frankish Empire. In the fifteenth century it was part of the Duchy of Flanders under French rule and an important centre of the wool trade. In 1513, the English King Henry VIII conquered Doornik, which makes it the only Low Country town that was ever under English rule. So the town was indeed important enough to have a tart connected to it. Yet this recipe is completely forgotten about; in fact, it only appears in these three texts.'

'In the 1950s edition of Ons Kookboek from the Farmers’ Wives’ Union is a recipe for ‘Luikse Appeltaart’ which is almost identical, with almond macaroons added to the mix and the cinnamon moving from the filling to the crust. This is my recipe based on the sixteenth-century recipes for Doornikse appeltaart.'