Fruit Tart for Summer

Ah, I love fruit tarts. Fresh fruit, pastry cream, a flaky tart shell. Yum, three essential components of a fabulous summer dessert. Although the weather, mangoes, and pineapple are great in Hawaii, we have some pretty bad berries (except strawberries!). So whenever I do get really good fresh fruit, I usually just eat it fresh. But.....I just couldn't resist after flipping through Sarabeth's Bakery's cookbook(which is where the recipe is from.)

Crostata for Daring Bakers

This is my second daring bakers challenge! The challenge was hosted by Simona over at Briciole. She picked crostata for this month's challenge. Crostata, which means tart, is an Italian dessert, and can be filled with a variety of fillings. Since it was Thanksgiving, I chose to make a pecan pie filling for a pecan tart.

The tart dough was a little too hard for me, but maybe I just didn't roll out the dough thin enough... oops. But anyways, the crust paired pretty well with the nuts. I guess the crunchyness of the crust complimented the sweet, semi softness of the nuts. Or at least I think. I brought it to the Thanksgiving dinner (along with several other types of desserts) and everyone said it was tasty, so I'm assuming they liked it.

I know I'm a little late, posting a pecan tart recipe and all, but I didn't start baking like crazy until this year, and anyways, I had way too much hw to begin Thanksgiving dessert testing. So sorry about posting this recipe after Thanksgiving, but you know, this tart can be enjoyed anytime of the year. Plus, it was really easy to make. I mean as long as you have all the ingredients, an oven, and a little time!

Crostata (Tart dough) Recipe can be found over at Simona's Blog Briciole

Pecan Tart Filling
Adapted from Tastespotting
Ingredients:
2 eggs
1/4 cup of granulated sugar
1/4 cup of brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon of kosher salt
1/3 cup of corn syrup
1/3 cup of whipping cream
1 tbs hazelnut extract
1 tbs maple syrup
2 tbs cup of butter, melted
1 cup of pecan halves

Directions:
1. In a bowl mix eggs, sugars, salt, and corn syrup until combined
2. Mix in the cream, extract, maple syrup, and butter
3. Add in the pecans and coat
4. Pour in to prepared tart and bake for 50 minutes at 350˚F
5. Enjoy!

Nectarine Tart

Today’s recipe is for…..a yummy tart! Do you love tarts? Aren’t they delicious? Don’t you wish you could have one right now? If you answered no to any of the questions ask yourself the following one: Have you ever had one????? If you answered no, then you HAVE to go make one. Like right now! I’m serious. Tarts are just that good. Look, see, delicious!

They may not be the healthiest, or the most simple, but they are pretty darn tasty! Okay, so maybe they actually are kinda simple. Like this recipe. I had a nectarine on hand, wasn’t doing anything, so I decided to make a nectarine tart. I made mini tarts, and you guys all remember my brother, steve, yea?, well he piled whipped cream and ice cream on top before engulfing it. What was weird was he put a huge thing of whipped cream on, first. And a tiny scoop of ice cream, on top. Weird? I think so. But anyways, he said it was really good. I know I didn’t cut the nectarines all pretty and stuff, but if you wanna, definitely go for it!

as you can see, my nectarines aren't all that pretty....sorry

 see, my brother just piled on the whipped cream. higher and higher it goes, where it stops no one knows!!

now with a little scoop of ice cream. It looks a little weird, doesn't it? maybe a little unbalanced?

Nectarine Tart
Crust:
4 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup butter

Filling:
3 tablespoon flour
4 tablespoon sugar
2 nectarine

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350˚F
2. In a bowl crumble the butter into the sugar and flour until small balls form
3. Press dough into tart pan, poke holes into the bottom using a fork, bake  for 15 minutes or until lightly browned
4. While the tart shell is cooling cut the nectarine
5. In a bowl combine the sliced nectarine, flour, and sugar. Pour into baked shell and bake for 10 minutes or until fruit is tender.

*tastes better with whipped cream and ice cream! or so my brother says...

My first fruit tart! :)

Fruit tarts are like 30 bucks each! That’s a lot, but after making this tart I totally figured out why they’re so expensive. It took a lot of work! But it was also really really fun.
So I used david lebovitz’s pastry dough recipe for the crust and made pastry cream to fill the tart. I topped the tarts with tons of different berries!!! Usually there aren’t fresh lookin berries in Hawaii cause it’s so far, but for some reason there were a ton at Costco!

Fruit Tart
Ingredients

Tart Shell
Pastry Cream, recipe below
2 pints fruits (I used blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, and strawberries)
1/3 cup apricot jelly

Directions
Fill the tart shells with the pastry cream. Arrange the berries decoratively on top of the cream. Melt the apricot jelly with 1 teaspoon of water and brush the top of the tarts. Ta dah!

Pastry Cream:
5 extra-large egg yolks, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch

1 1/2 cups scalded milk
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the egg yolks and sugar on medium-high speed for 4 minutes, or until very thick. Reduce to low speed, and add the cornstarch.
With the mixer still on low, slowly pour the hot milk into the egg mixture. Pour the mixture into a medium saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the mixture thickens, 5 to 7 minutes. Cook, whisking constantly, for another 2 minutes; the custard will come together and become very thick, like pudding. Stir in the vanilla and butter. Place plastic wrap directly on the custard and refrigerate until cold.
Yield: 2 cups

strawberries...