When life is sour like lemons, make a lemon tart to beat those weekday blues and cure every nasty emotions in your system. Sometimes dessert makes everything better. I mean not sometimes but MOST of the time. There goes the famous saying: desserts is stressed spelt backwards.
In celebration of my brother in law’s birthday, I decided to bake him a “bigger” lemon tart. Not very much bigger. I’ll say about 3.5” bigger but at least, it’s significantly noticeable and more presentable as a birthday “cake”. After a few subtle hints dropped here and there, I got it I got it. He wanted a bigger tart and he wanted it tangy. My sis ever once told me that maybe he is pregnant. After all who craves for sour stuff all the time. Hahha I can understand why because lemon tarts are tangy but not in an overpowering way. It does not make you cringe with every bite. I guess you just have to find the right balance. This lemon tart is baked. The crust is par baked for 10mins with weights on, after 10 mins, the weights are removed and crust is baked for another 20 mins. The lemon filling is then poured onto the baked crust and baked for another 25-30 mins until filling has set. This yields a really delicious lemon tart that is more solid and does not run when cut with a knife.
If you prefer the non bake kind of lemon tart or lemon curd tart which I would call it, you can get the recipe here. Both are equally delicious I promise. Just that the lemon curd tart has a crust that is baked but the filling is set overnight and not baked thus yielding a more custardy ( similar to the custard in a fruit tart). When cut with a knife, you get that custardy almost gooey filling. I have no personal preference btw the two, I just know that both are equally tasty.
I decorated the top of the tart with some cream cheese frosting, a sprinkle of dried lavender flowers and glazed fresh blueberries.
Lemon Tart ( Makes 1 8.5″ Round tart )
Ingredients for crust:
187g all purpose flour
52g icing sugar
95g butter, cold and cubed
1.5 egg yolk
3/4 tsp lemon zest
Steps:
1) In a food processor, pulse flour and icing sugar until well mixed
2) Add in cold butter and pulse until mixture becomes crumbly
3) Add in zest and egg yolks and pulse till mixture comes together. If mixture is too dry, add in a little water to bind the dough till it comes into a ball.
4) Flatten dough and wrap with cling wrap
5) Refrigerate for 30mins to 1hr to set the dough
Ingredients for Lemon Filling:
62ml lemon juice
3 eggs
87g castor sugar
95ml whipping cream
1 tsp lemon zest
1) In a mixing bowl, whisk lemon juice, eggs, castor sugar and whipping cream until well mixed
2) Sieve mixture
3) Stir in lemon zest
Ingredients for Cream Cheese Frosting
60g cream cheese, RT
30g unsalted butter, RT
1/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted
Dried Lavender Flowers
1) Mix cheese, butter, sugar until light and fluffy
2) Mix in lavender flowers.
Assembly of Tart:
1) Preheat oven to 160C.
2) Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface. I like to roll them between 2 pieces of cling wrap.
3) Press gently into tin and trim off excess pastry.
4) Use a fork to prick bottom of pastry with holes and return to fridge to set another 30 mins.
5) When dough is set, line the tart with foil and fill with rice or weights and bake for 10 mins
6) Remove tart from oven and remove the foil and bake for another 20 mins until lightly golden.
7) Remove from oven and pour in lemon filling and bake for another 25-30 mins until just set
8) Remove from oven and cool completely.
9) Pipe cream cheese using a round piping tip.
Other Recipes you might love:
Healthy Avocado Mousse Tart with Gula Melaka (Click the Link Here)
Lemon Curd Tart with Cherries (Click the Link Here)
Nutella Tart (Click the Link Here)
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