April 22, 2012

Strawberry Mascarpone Tart

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There is nothing as 'summer lovin' as berries and no berry more demurely attractive than the strawberry. And no berry tart more pretty and easy to make than the Strawberry Mascarpone Tart! As the summer rolls around again this year we are starting to see more and more berries of all kinds at the market.

This recipe is another ode to the organic strawberries that we have recently discovered to taste delightfully of "strawberry" as we remember from days of old: fiendishly sweet to the taste and divinely fragrant.  Instead of the regular strawberries nowadays that smell good but taste of nothing.

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As per my confession in an earlier post on Berry Tarts I have not been making these sort of tarts until recently having perhaps been intimidated by the cool beauty of these lovely tarts in all their gleaming colorful glory.  But I now know that the tart filling is not that hard to make, especially the mascarpone filling below which is my favorite filling for its ease of making and absolute yummy, addictive taste.  (You can make it in 5 minutes flat!)Who know that cream cheese could taste that good?!  

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I just realized that mascarpone could be made at home.  I've got to try that soon as mascarpone is unfortunately getting more and more expensive to buy here in Hong Kong.  Which sucks because I really love the taste of mascarpone desserts like this tart and tiramisu.  It also makes an interesting and tasty alternative to cream for cake frosting.  

Wow, if I can really make it at home, there may develop a serious problem of overindulgence because I am really loving italian desserts more and more.  It just seems that they are more of the "real" kind of desserts that people can enjoy everyday, even making it themselves without too much effort whereas other desserts, the french stuff for example, while delicious and all that are really quite snooty when it comes down to it.

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So if you really want to impress your family this summer just whip up one of these strawberry tarts and see what they have to say.  My family was so impressed that I am now effectively barred from buying outside tarts but must make strawberry tarts fresh for our summery feasts.
Strawberry Mascarpone Tart Recipe
Adapted from the recipes in La dolce vita by Michele Scicolone.  
Prep time: 15 mins plus chilling time   Cook time: 30 mins

Ingredients:

    Single Crust Pasta Frolla
  • 1 1/3 cup all purpose flour
  • 3 tbsp sugar
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 lemon, grated zest of
  • 8 tbsp cold butter, cut to pieces
  • 1 large egg lightly beaten
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
    Mascarpone Filling
  • 1 cup mascarpone
  • 2 tbsp sugar
  • 1/4 cup cream
  • 1 pint strawberries
    Glaze over Strawberries
  • 1/2 cup seedless raspberry jam
  • 2 tbsp sugar

Directions:

Make the crust: Combine the flour, sugar, salt and zest together and mix with your fingers until the zest has been thoroughly combined with other ingredients.  Toss in the cold butter pieces and use a bread knife, fork or dough cutter to continue chopping the butter into pieces and mixing it in with the flour mixture until it all becomes a crumbly mixture, with big pieces and small pieces is fine.  

Add in your lightly beaten egg and the vanilla extract and toss to incorporate.  The key here is to handle it as little as possible.  Lightly shape the dough into a disk, wrap and chill for an hour or overnight.

Using the least amount of flour possible, roll out the chilled dough on a lightly floured surface to an 11 inch circle.  Lightly flour the top of the dough and your rolling pin and then roll the dough around the rolling pin in order to pick up and deposit over your 9 inch tart pan .  Fit the dough into the pan and trim off the excess dough.  

Prick the bottom of crust with a fork at 1 inch intervals.  Wrap and put in the freezer for 2 hours or until frozen. (The freezing seems to prevent the side from shrinking too much during baking.)

Preheat oven to 400 F.  Butter a sheet of aluminium and place the butter side down onto the crust and then fill the tart pan with beans or whatever you have on hand (I used rice).  Bake for 20 minutes and then take out, remove the beans and the aluminium, prick with fork again and then bake for 5 to 10 minutes longer or until the crust is a golden brown.  Let it cool down before adding the filling and topping.

Make the Filling: Mix together mascarpone, sugar and cream and beat until light and fluffy.  Spread the mix evenly into the tart crust.  

Make the Glaze: Cut the strawberries into thin slices and arrange in an overlapping pattern over the mascarpone filling.  In a small sauce pot, heat jam and sugar to simmer and cook until a bit thicker, a few minutes at most.  The jam should still be able to be brushed evenly over the strawberries with a pastry brush.  Coat strawberries evenly and serve right away.

Store covered in fridge for up to 5 days.  Enjoy!

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2 comments:

  1. Drooling 😀
    What cream do u used in the filling?

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    Replies
    1. Hey Lynn - we used a mascarpone (a thick delicious Italian cream cheese) filling, it's my favorite, so yummy! ~ellen

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