Strawberry custard tart: crisp shortcrust, vanilla cream, fresh fruit
The June tart that looks like it came from a pâtisserie: a shortcrust base blind-baked so it stays crisp, a homemade vanilla custard made with egg yolks, and half a kilo of strawberries arranged in rings on top. Three simple parts, each easy on its own; the whole art is keeping the base cold when it goes into the oven and the custard warm when it goes onto the base.
Your own work in that: 35 min.
- Shortcrust 10 min
- Dough chilling 30 min
- Tin in the freezer 15 min
- Blind baking 25 min
- Custard 15 min
- Assembly 10 min
- Setting in the fridge 90 min
Step by step
0 / 7 doneMake the shortcrust
Mix the flour, icing sugar and salt, add the cold cubed butter and rub in with your fingertips to fine crumbs. Add the yolk and ice-cold water and bring together quickly into a ball: no longer than a minute. Flatten into a disc, wrap in film and chill 30 minutes.
Ingredients: 250 g plain flour · 150 g butter · 60 g icing sugar · 1 pcs egg yolk · 2 tbsp water · 1 pinch salt
TipShortcrust hates warmth and long kneading: the butter should stay cold and the dough be brought together briefly, because long kneading develops gluten and the base turns hard instead of crumbly. Warm hands? Hold them under cold water for a moment.
Cold butter, crumbs, briefly brought togetherLine the tin
Roll the chilled dough between two sheets of baking paper to 3–4 mm and transfer to a 28 cm tart tin. Press into the base and sides, trim the excess, prick the base with a fork. Put the tin in the freezer for 15 minutes and heat the oven to 180 °C.
TipFrozen dough going into a hot oven shrinks down the sides far less. That quarter of an hour in the freezer decides whether the tart has an even rim.
Pressed in, pricked, into the freezerBlind bake
Cover the pastry with baking paper, fill with weights (dried beans, peas, rice) and bake 15 minutes. Remove the paper and weights and bake another 10 minutes, until golden. Cool completely in the tin.
TipWithout weights the base domes and the sides slump. A jar of 'tart beans' kept for the purpose lasts for years.
Paper, beans, 15 minutes; without beans 10 minutesCook the custard
Pour off 100 ml of the milk and whisk it with the yolks, sugar, vanilla sugar, potato starch and flour into a smooth slurry. Bring the rest of the milk to the boil, pour it in a thin stream into the slurry, whisking, and return everything to the pan. Cook over low heat, whisking constantly, until thick and bubbling (about 4 minutes), then 1 minute more. Take off the heat and stir in the butter.
Ingredients: 500 ml milk · 3 pcs egg yolks · 80 g sugar · 30 g potato starch · 20 g plain flour · 1 tbsp vanilla sugar · 30 g butter
TipThe custard must come to the boil: only then does the starch fully set and the yolks lose the enzyme that would thin the cream after a few hours. Cover with film touching the surface so no skin forms.
Thick, glossy, boiled for a minuteSpread the custard on the base
Spread the warm (not hot) custard over the cooled base and level with a spatula. Warm cream spreads smoothly; cold would have to be mashed into place.
Warm cream, cold baseArrange the strawberries
Wash, dry and hull the strawberries, halve them. Arrange cut side down in rings from the edge to the centre, tightly, pressing lightly into the custard. Cut side down: the glossy skin faces up and the cut face does not dry out.
Ingredients: 500 g strawberries · 1 tbsp icing sugar
TipWant a shop-window shine? Melt 2 spoons of apricot jam with a spoon of water, push through a sieve and brush over the fruit.
Rings from the edge, cut side downChill and serve
Refrigerate 90 minutes, until the custard sets and cuts into clean slices. Dust the rim with icing sugar before serving. Best the same day; the next day the base softens slightly from the fruit.
Three layers in one slice
Before you start
With raspberries or blueberries
The same tart with 400 g raspberries or blueberries in summer; place raspberries whole, hollow side down.
Custard from a packet
In a hurry: 1 packet of vanilla pudding powder for 500 ml milk with 2 spoons of sugar, cooked as on the packet, plus 30 g butter. Less eggy, but it works.
The base went soft
The custard went on too hot, or the tart sat too long with the fruit. The cream should be warm, not steaming, and a strawberry tart eaten within 24 hours.
