I'm away at the moment, so I thought I'd leave you with one of my most popular blog posts.
The Classic Lemon Tart.
With the holiday season creeping up on the calendar in the North Hemisphere and Summer about to appear in the Southern Hemisphere (when lemons will be plentiful) it's a great recipe for entertaining no matter what the occasion.
I've included the recipe below but please forgive me for not putting the different measurements.
Classic Lemon Tart (serves 12 at least)
Ingredients:
10 eggs380g caster sugar500 ml Double creamzest and juice of 8 lemonsbutter, for greasing225g sweet shortcrust pastry (see recipe below)
To Serve:
100g mild goat's cheese
50 ml double cream
2 tbsp icing sugar, plus extra for dusting
a little whipping cream
1. Preheat oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas Mark 6.
2. To make the filling, break the eggs into a bowl and whisk gently to break up the yolks.
3. Add the sugar and continue to mix, then add the cream and lemon juice, but not the zest.
4. Pass the mixture through a sieve, add the lemon zest and leave to one side.
5. Butter a 20cm plain, loose-bottomed flan tin with softened butter and roll out the pastry to get a thin even depth to the pastry.
6. Carefully roll the pastry back over the rolling pin, lift over the tin and roll the pastry back over the tin very loosely. If you don't leave the slack, the pastry will rip or shrink too much when cooking.
7. Tuck the pastry down the sides of the tin, pressing into the bottom edge well, but be careful not to tear or stretch the pastry. Don't trim the pastry.
8. Line the tart with a circle of grease-proof paper that is bigger than the tart and allows the paper to rise above the ring.
9. Fill the tart with either baking beans, rice or ceramic baking beans. Bake for 10 minutes.
10. Remove from the oven and remove the beans and grease-proof paper, then place back in the oven to colour the bottom of the tart. This should only take 3-4 minutes.
11. Turn the oven down to 100°C/225°F/Gas Mark ½.
12. Pour in the lemon mix to reach the top of the tart and bake for 1 hour until the tart is only just set.
13. Remove from the oven and trim off the edges of the pastry. Leave to cool for about 1 hour.
14. To make the accompanying cream, mix the goat's cheese with the double cream and icing sugar.
15. To serve, dust the tart with plenty of icing sugar and grill under a hot grill to caramelize the top.
16. Remove from the grill and cut into wedges and serve with a spoonful of the cream.
Rich shortcrust pastry ~ makes 300g
Ingredients:
200g plain flour
¼ tsp salt
2 tbsp icing sugar (if making sweet pastry)
100g cold unsalted butter, cubed
1 egg, beaten
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tbsp iced water
Method:
Mix together the flour and salt (and icing sugar if making sweet pastry). Add half the cubed butter to the flour. Gently and swiftly, rub the fat into the flour until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Add the rest of the butter and mix until it's the size of small peas. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients.
Mix the egg with the lemon juice and water and gradually pour into the well a little at a time, rubbing it through your fingers, until it forms a dough (you may not need all the liquid).
Turn out onto a floured board and knead lightly until smooth.
Shape into a ball, wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
To line a tin or mould, roll the chilled pastry onto the rolling pin, then unroll over the tin, draping the pastry into the tin or mould. Gently press it in place using your fingers.
I tend only to bake this tart for special occasions...but to simplify the recipe I suppose you could use (sharp intake of breath) packet pastry!!!!
I'll love and leave you for now.
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