I adore a custard tart. We have hens and ducks and in the spring and summer months have a glut of duck eggs which add richness to the dish. If you can't get duck eggs, 9 large hen eggs will be fine.The rhubarb purée makes enough for you to serve on the side with the tart. I often make double the quantity of pastry and freeze half.
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Ingredients
Rhubarb puree
1kgrhubarbcut into 1cm pieces
100gunsalted butter
170gcaster sugar
2 slicesfresh ginger
Sweet pastry
225gflour
1 lemonzested
150gcold unsalted buttercut into cubes
75gicing sugar
1egg
1egg yolk
custard
500mldouble cream
9duck egg yolks or large hen egg yolks
75gcaster sugar
1tspground ginger
1 tspground nutmeg
Equipment
22cm pastry ring 3-4 cm deep or 22cm loose bottom tart tin 3-4cm deep
Food processor
Stick blender
Instructions
Rhubarb purée
Place all the purée ingredients in a pan over a low heat. Cook for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat, discard the ginger and blend to a smooth paste. Using a wooden spoon, pass through a fine sieve, and set aside to cool
Sweet pastry
Place all the ingredients except the egg and egg yolk in a food processor. Pulse until it resembles bread crumbs. Add the egg and egg yolk and pulse again until the mixture starts to some together. Turn out on a floured surface and gently bring it together until just smooth. Form into a ball then flatten and wrap in cling film and chill for 2 hours.
Preheat the oven to 180C fan
Butter the pastry ring or case and line with greaseproof paper and place on a baking tray
Roll out the pastry to about 2mm thick and carefully drop into the ring. Using excess pastry, gently push the pastry into the edges, leaving some spare pastry over the top. Prick with a fork. Keep any other extra bits for repairs.
Line the pastry with foil (shiny side up) or baking paper and fill to the top with rice and bake for 10-15 minutes, until very lightly coloured. Remove the foil/baking paper and rice.
Spread about half the purée over the base of the pastry case and return to the oven for 5 minutes to form a skin.
Custard
Pour the cream into a pan and bring to the boil. In a bowl, lightly whisk the egg yolks and sugar. Gradually pour the cream over the yolks and keep whisking then return to the pan. Heat through very gently, stirring all the time for about 2 minutes. Strain the custard through a fine sieve into a jug.
Assembly
Place the tart case in the oven and very carefully pour the custard up to the brim. Sprinkle with ginger and nutmeg and bake for 30-40 minutes until the filling has just set. Remove from the oven and cover with a baking tray for 10 minutes to continue cooking slightly. Then remove and leave to cool completely.