Divine Strawberry Tart

 

Winter in UK is veeeeeery long. It is mild most of the time, but way too long! Even now we have only 7C in the morning and it is already 15th of June!

I am a creature who shivers when the temperature falls down below 20C, so cold days are just not to my liking.  At all!

But there comes a time when you see light at the end of a tunnel. It is STRAWBERRIES time.

 

 

It is the most pleasant view I can imagine.

Celebration starts with countless recipes using freshly picked strawberries. This one is one of my favourite.

For the pastry you will need:

150g plain flour

50g ground almonds

30g icing sugar

100g chilled butter

1 egg

pinch of salt

You can use food processor or do it by hand. Just mix all the ingredients together to create the dough. Do not overwork it. Wrap in a cling film and put in the fridge for at least 1h.

When ready, roll it out to 5mm thickness and line tart tin, dock the dough  and bake in 160C for about 15min or until golden brown.

For the filling you will need:

6 egg yolks

120g caster sugar

20g plain flour

20g corn flour

450ml whole milk

2tsp almond extract

*100g unsalted butter*

Whisk egg yolks with sugar until light and creamy. Add flours, 50ml milk and almond extract to the mixture. Boil the rest of the milk and when it is ready pour it over the egg mix and return to hob. Now it is really important to boil it over a low heat for at least 1 min. constantly stirring. It must be heated to the temperature high enough to destroy the amylase enzyme present in egg yolks, which would otherwise break down the starch and make the pastry cream runny (before I knew the science behind this, I had a pastry cream pouring onto my table after slicing a piece many times!)

When it is nice and thick pour it over the tart shell and leave it to cool. 

* You can also add some butter to the warm pastry cream. It will be richer in taste and it will have creamier texture.

To finish you will need:

As many strawberries as you want on the top

Some roasted almond flakes

Mint leaves - not necessary but it is a nice colour contrast to red fruits.

Enjoy! ...... just remember to share. It will be difficult!

The recipe comes from one of the finest baking blogs I have ever seen - mojewypieki.com . It is in Polish though.