Gâteau Breton Recipe (2024)

Put regular granulated sugar into the food processor and take it for a spin before adding flour and salt. This will make "superfine". No change in measurement.

Hi MC! To make it really authentic, add a few drops of essence de Bergamot to the yolks. This is the greatest shortbread/cake to have with afternoon tea! With prunes, it's called a "far breton". So good! My recipe is the same....very old-school. Love the dragging the fork tines overtop to make the signature decorative pattern. Merci!

The perfect recipe to use the yolks after making macaroons. I added 1/4 tsp. of raw apple cider vinegar to the dough for extra flakiness. My husband wanted frangipane AND prune filling, so I added the frangipane from David Lebovitz to much success. It was helpful to use a parchment lined spring form pan to avoid having to invert the cake. I'm glad I used a cookie sheet underneath due to leaking butter. This is a must repeat recipe - thanks Melissa!

Is the cake pan a springform pan? Else, how do you get the gateau out of the pan?

I substituted dried cherries for the prunes, using kirsch instead of rum, and used 3/4 cup of water. Also, I used an 8 1/2 inch springform pan, and it worked very well.

Use a fluted edge French tart pan, with a removable bottom. Mine are black, from years of making gateau breton.

Superfine is also sometimes called Caster Sugar. Most grocery stores have superfine, Domino's makes it, if not in baking aisle, try where the bar supplies are, like bitters and mixers etc. It is often used to make co*cktails.

Found Gateau Breton with almond filling in a patisserie in Montparnasse this past July and couldn't get enough of it.

Bonjour Melissa,
I love your columns. Being French and 1/4 Breton, I would recommend to try the plain one first. No prunes, no apricots. Quality of butter is essential.
This cake is fun to make. I would recommend a nice glass of hard cider (not too sweet as there is enough sweetness in the cake). That plus a kouing, and invite friends over!

I thought this recipe would be perfect as the finish to an intense prime rib dinner & overall blow out foodie evening--it was! I asked my daughter-in-law to make it--Superlative! She chose to use both dried apricots as well as prunes. She also used a spring form pan. Also--no food processer--just a plug-in hand mixer--no problem. A total success-- the finished result looked EXACTLY like the photo in this recipe. I think we've discovered a new holiday favorite.

Armagnac! (prune cognac, basically)

It seems to be hard to find superfine sugar nowadays, but I understand you can pulse regular granulated sugar a few times in your food processor for a similar result.

C&H calls their superfine sugar "Bakers Sugar", most supermarket around here (west coast, USA) carry it.

The parchment paper should come up the sides of the pan so that the pastry releases when inverted. Trim as needed.

Could a preparation with apricot, PLUS some chocolate scattered with the fruit in the middle layer, work?

Flavor was delicious, and despite my fears, it was the perfect amount of filling (feared it wasn’t enough). But I found the pastry impossible to work with as a disk—either too brittle to fit easily into the pan, or too soft to handle as an intact disk. Tried twice. I’m not quite ready to give up, but will try a different recipe that uses a thick batter that can be spread in the pan, rather than a pastry disk.

I used a tart pan with a push bottom lined with parchment paper as another commenter noted, and put a very old half sheet underneath to catch drips. Used cherries instead of prunes, but kept the rum. Managed to find superfine sugar of all places at a large Asian market. Had friends over, and between 3 of us, we ate the whole thing! OMG it was great! This is going into my "special cakes" rotation.

This turned out so well! The apricot filling was nice. Next time I want to try Nutella in the center.

I have a beloved cake recipe that takes 5 egg whites. From now on I'll be making two cakes. This is easy and delicious and i won't be wasting all those eggs yolks!

This was fabulous. My husband raved about it. Who knew prunes and rum would go so well together. I made the dough and the prune mixture the day before I baked it. I did have to let the dough sit for about 15 minutes before I could roll it out. I’ll be making this again.

Sorry, as a breton and the daughter of a pastry chef I am scandalized that you would make a gateau breton with unsalted butter to start. Secondly, whoever said the version with prunes is called a far is deeply mistaken. A far breton is an entirely different dessert resembling a custard.

Agree with Kadia, 3 years, you need a professional size food processor -LARGE. Sadly, I should have read the notes further than I did. Could you be a bit more specific or give hints about how to handle 'other dried fruits'.Gonna use the processor? Throw regular sugar in it for a few spins before the flour and salt.My gateau Breton is a tad ugly, but tasty!

I searched in vain for another recipe that would explain how to make the caramel filling. Finding none, I improvised by using a caramel candy recipe but cooking only until soft ball stage. I scraped the hot caramel into a glass pie plate to let it cool, then used it in lieu of the fruit filling. Very pleased with the results. Note that you need to let the cake cool completely before serving so that the warm caramel does not run out.

This is spectacular, and spectacularly easy too. You can make the prune filling and the pastry the day before, then all you need to do the "day of" is assemble it and pop it in the oven, so it's great for dinner parties. I use armagnac instead of rum with the prunes.

Hi I like Hut, do want to try this with Nutella. I saw in a search chocolate filling can be used. Has anyone tried it with Nutella or a chocolate filling. This will be my Christmas family dinner dessert!

I studied at La Varenne in Paris, in 1980. We were taught to plump the prunes with Armagnac liquor. This is a great addition too. If you do not want to use the liquor you can also put the prunes in a strong tea. This is another great flavor choice with prunes.

I had four large egg yolks leftover from a different recipe so cut the recipe in half and used a 5” cake pan. Bake time was about the same. Turned out great!

is there any reason why i shouldn't roll the dough into the circles before it's chilled instead of letting the dough get cold and then struggle with rolling it out?anyway, it's 2 years since the last post, but i thought i'd check in, having recently discovered this fabulous recipe ~ now i'm making my 2nd one, changing up the flour to whole wheat pastry, using fra'angelico instead of rum for the apricot filling and adding vanilla

I suggest doing step 1 while the dough is chilling.