Inspired by the Great British bake Off on BBC 2, I decided to try the Tarte au citron using the Mary Berry recipe which was featured in the September '11 Good Food Magazine. I had already made one papercraft project so thought I could take some time out to bake something yummy for tea-time
175g plain flour, 100 cold butter cut into cubes, 25g sifted icing sugar - made into fine breadcrumb like texture in the Chef then added one large egg yolk and one tablespoon of cold water - pulsed to amalgamate
Followed the instructions for rolling out the pastry, lined the loose based tin, pricked with a fork, put in some greaseproof paper and my baking beans (mine are actually dried marrowfat peas, they last for ages) and baked for 15 minutes then removed peas and paper and returned to oven for further 10 minutes then left it to cool while I made the filling.
5 large eggs, 125ml double cream, 225g caster sugar, finely grated zest and juice (150mls) of 4 unwaxed lemons. I poured the juice through my conical sieve to remove the pips. I had measured everything correctly, but when I poured the filling into the pastry case, I had too much filling - or was my pastry case not high enough? I'll make it higher next time! I poured the excess filling into a dish and baked it in the oven with the flan.
The finished tart - I sifted icing sugar over the top and left it to cool - looks nice but can't taste until tea time. However, Haggis always lies as close as he can to the oven when any food is being cooked, just to make sure he gets a taste, but as you can see, it took so long Haggis lost interest and snoozed in a patch of sunlight!!
Mary G x
