Shortcrust Pastry – a Recipe for a Success
On my blog, there are already recipes for tarts, both sweet and savoury. But I still haven’t included a recipe for a Fruit Tart, so it was time to change it.
I used a classic French recipe for pâté brisée (shortcrust pastry) that is made only with flour, salt, butter, iced water, and – optionally – a tiny amount of sugar.
To ensure a perfect base of a tart, compact but still light and crispy, French use special low-gluten flour. I didn’t have it, but even the regular flour produced an excellent crispy texture.
Although making shortcrust pastry is pretty simple, you should remember a few main rules.
Firstly, the butter and flour should be very well rubbed in or “broken together” (hence the French name pâté brisée – “broken dough”) using either your fingertips or a food processor. Only once you achieve it, you can add ice-cold water.
Secondly, you should not overwork the dough when you knead it. If you do, the baked tart base will be tough.
Chilling the pastry is also crucial. You have to keep it in the fridge for a minimum of 2 hours before you use it and at least 30 minutes before you put the rolled base in the oven.
So ensuring you end up with the perfect shortcrust pastry does take time, but the result is certainly worth it.
Shortcrust Pastry Fruit Tart
Ingredients
Shortcrust Pastry
- 175 g plain flour
- 0.5 tsp salt
- 1 tsp caster sugar
- 120 g butter thinly diced
- 3 tbsp water iced
Crème Patissiere
- 3 egg yolks
- 400 ml milk
- 45 g plain flour
- 80 g powdered sugar
- 1 vanilla pod
- strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries to decorate (you will need 300-500g in total)
Instructions
- Mix the flour, salt, and caster sugar; add the butter and either rub it in using your fingertips or whizz everything in a food processor until you get fine crumbs.
- Mix the flour, salt, and caster sugar; add the butter and either rub it in using your fingertips or whizz everything in a food processor until you get fine crumbs.
- While you are mixing the dough, slowly add the water. If the consistency continues to be very crumbly, add another tablespoon of water and if it is too wet, add a bit more flour.
- Quickly combine the dough by kneading it; create a smooth ball, flatten it, cover in cling film and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
- Butter well a bottom and a side of a 23cm-diameter loose-bottom tart tin.
- Roll the pastry thinly (best done between 2 sheets of baking paper), transfer it into the tin and pierce the pastry with a fork a few times, chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
- Preheat an oven to 220 Celsius degrees (200 for fan ovens).
- Line the pastry in the tin with baking paper and put baking beans on top.
- Transfer the tin to the hot oven and immediately decrease the temperature to 190 Celsius degrees (170 for fan ovens); bake for 15 minutes. Remove the paper and beans and bake for 5 minutes more.
- While the pastry is in the oven baking prepare the crème patissiere:
- Beat the egg yolks with sugar until pale and creamy, and then add the flour, whisk to combine.
- Boil the milk with the split vanilla pod.
- Pour approx. a quarter of the hot milk to the egg mixture, whisk till combined, add another quarter, whisk again and repeat till you have used all the milk.
- Transfer the egg and milk mixture back to the pot in which you boiled the milk and heat up on a medium heat while stirring with a hand whisk constantly to prevent it from burning.
- When the mixture is the right consistency (thick), transfer it onto the baked and cooled pastry, spread it and decorate with the berries.
