Classic Fruit Tart : ABC July 2012

Avid Bakers' Challenge (ABC) for July is Classic Fruit Tart where, we at ABC is currently baking from "The Weekend Baker" by Abigail Johnson Dodge, once a month. This is the seventh bake this year and like all the rest of the 6 bakes we had for the past months, this is a keeper. I was late at posting it for this month as I was saving to make this for my birthday. Since there has been quite a number of cakes lately, and with my son's birthday cake last week, I thought that I would settle for this Classic Fruit Tart, besides I love tarts, both sweet and savory.

I use a pastry binder to mix the ingredients for the crust.

Shape into a round, flatten to a 5" diameter round, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes. I left mine refrigerated overnight.

The next morning, when I took the dough out, it was really hard and stiff, so I left it for about 15-20 minutes before rolling it out. The dough is rather fragile and quite difficult to handle, as what I've read from other fellow bakers at ABC.  I decided to have a go at rolling, if that fails, than I'll just press the dough in the tart pan, cos I really wanted to practice! I positioned the dough in between two plastic sheets, not cling wrap, as cling wrap is rather flimsy, use a thicker sheet of plastic. I rolled the dough using a rolling pin gently to about 2" bigger than my 9 inch tart pan. Next I peel off the top layer of the plastic gently, place the removable bottom of the tart pan in the center of the dough, then position the outer tart pan over it. Then very gently, with both hands holding the sides of the tart pan, I gather the plastic from under the dough gently, and very slowly, flip the dough with the whole of the tart pan right side up. The plastic is now on the top, very gently press the plastic to the sides of the inner pan so that the dough is all around the pan (first pic, can you see the plastic on top of the dough). Then gently pull off the plastic (second pic). It sort of works for me, but then since the dough is really very soft, it breaks a little at the sides, which is easily patched up by pinching the soft dough together. 

After the touch-up, which was really quick.
Place the dough in the freezer for at least 30 minutes, place a large sheet of aluminium foil over the dough and fill with baking beans. Bake for 15 minutes, remove foil and beans and bake for another 5 minutes. Leave completely cool before assembling tart.

The pastry cream :

Combine the yolks, sugar, flour and whisk until well blended and pale in colour.

Heat some milk to a simmer. Pour into the yolk mixture, whisking constantly (first pic). Pour everything back into the saucepan and cook over medium-low heat, whisking constantly until mixture is thick and comes to a boil, whisking constantly for a further one minute.

Scrape the cream into a bowl, place a piece of plastic directly over the cream, and refrigerate until cold. I left it overnight in the fridge. The next afternoon, I whipped the heavy cream until stiff and add to the yolk mixture above and fold together just until blended. Wow, the cream is really silky smooth and thick.

Assemble the tart : Spread the cream all over the crust, but I find that the cream begins to soften as it was very hot in my kitchen, the weather was terribly hot! I freeze the tart in the freezer for about two hours. Then I arrange the pieces of fruits all over. I refrigerated the whole tart in the freezer once again as I find that the cream is still a little too soft. It stays there until it's time to eat! And that was about 2 hours later! And with the times the tart went in and out of the freezer, I have forgotten to glaze the fruits with some apricot glaze! 

This is a lovely fruit tart. The crust is nice, which I think I overbaked it a little. The cream is lovely though I feel that it needs to be sweeten just a tiny bit more. I use fresh kiwis, canned peaches and a couple of leftover strawberries. I especially love the kiwis, juicy, sweet with a little tanginess. By the time my family had enough, there are none left. Nope, there was no leftovers. And my son commented that I should have made this for his birthday instead of the chocolate cake last week! I guess he must have forgotten that he chose that cake himself!  :o)

Please do visit ABC to see the other fellow bakers take on this lovely tart. They have used all the lovely berries;  blackberries, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries which I'm practically drooling over! If you would like to join ABC, please contact Hanaa.



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