Blueberry and Raspberry Summer Fruit Tarts
“Happiness is a bowl of fresh berries”
…or maybe a bunch of fresh berries on top of a shortcrust mini tart and creamy vanilla custard? I’ll take the latter version š Here’s my favorite fruit tart recipe- hope you enjoy it as much as I do!
Shortcrust Tarts
1 cup butter
2 cups flour
4 tbsp sugar
pinch of salt
2 eggs, separated
a bit less than 1/4 cup water
1 tsp vanilla
Beat butter in stand mixer until smooth. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, salt. Beat together two egg yolks with water. Add dry ingredients to butter in parts, beating in between additions. Add the eggs to the mixture and then the vanilla. When dough clumps together, remove from stand mixer and wrap well with plastic wrap. Place in fridge overnight. Save egg whites in refrigerator to brush tarts with later while baking.
Remove dough from refrigerator and place in pre-buttered tart pans (with removable bottoms). Pre-heat oven to 375F. Prick the tarts with a fork and place in the freezer for about 20 minutes. Remove from freezer and cover each little tart pan with parchment baking paper and fill middle with dried beans or rice (or pie weights if you have those) so that the dough does not rise while baking. Bake for 15-20 minutes this way. Then remove from oven, remove beans/rice/weights/parchment paper and cover with egg white wash. Return to oven for a few minutes until golden-brown. Make sure they donāt burn! Let the tarts cool to room temperature before removing from tart pans.
Vanilla Custard Cream
3 egg yolks
1 tbsp flour
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 cup reduced fat milk
1 tsp vanilla
4 tbsp sugar
2/3 cup heavy cream
1 tbsp sugar
Beat egg yolks, flour, cornstarch in stand mixer until it becomes pale yellow and thickens a bit. Now boil milk, vanilla, and sugar together in a small saucepan. Once boiled, pour milk mixture into egg mixture, and mix well. Next pour this back into the saucepan and boil once more. This will thicken very quickly so stir constantly and do not look away. Once thickened, remove from stove and pour into a bowl. Allow to cool a bit, then cover with plastic wrap (touching the custard so a film does not develop) and place in fridge until cool. Meanwhile, in stand mixer, beat heavy cream to soft peaks. Add sugar and beat to stiff peaks. Fold this in parts into the cooled cream you’ve taken out of the refrigerator. Now your vanilla pastry cream is ready!
Use a spoon to divide the vanilla custard cream among the small tarts. Next, place blueberries and raspberries in any arrangement on top. Thatās it! The optional step if youād like a glaze over your tarts ( especially if you donāt eat them right away), is to just boil some raspberry jam until you get a thick liquid consistency of the raspberry jam, and then just brush this over the berries on the top of your tart.
Bon Appetit!
