Joe Anderson Our Eat and Tweet style Strawberry Tarts can be a little time consuming to make, but they are lovely, fresh and perfect for summer.
The cupcake shaped shortbread is filled with freshly whipped double cream and topped with fresh strawberries, making them almost the perfect treat for sitting down and watching the tennis.
Here’s how you make them, but before getting started pre-heat the oven to 180c and grease a 12 hole muffin tray with butter.
Strawberry Tarts – Eat and Tweet Style
For the shortbread:
250g plain flour
75g caster sugar
175g butter, softened
Method
Making the shortbread is simple really. Just mix together the butter, flour and sugar until a dough is formed. If the mixture is crumbly then simply add a little water. Once you have a dough roll it out onto a flat, floured surface until it is around 3cm thick and find a round cutter which is slightly larger than the holes in your muffin tray. Cut out one piece of shortbread and place it into the hole. It should fit in almost like a pasty/pie shape, with a hollow middle. It’ll probably fill around half the hole, this is perfect.
Repeat until you have the shortbread mix in all 12 holes. As mentioned, there should be space in the middle of the mixture to hold your caramel, but for now you’ll need to blind bake these shortbread pasties by placing some greaseproof paper in the middle of each.
To cut the greaseproof paper you should use the same pastry cutter and simply use a sharp knife to cut out a circle of the same shape to place in the middle. Once you have done this place some baking beans on top as this will allow the shortbread to bake while keeping the shape in the middle.
Bake for around 10 minutes then remove the greaseproof paper and baking beans and then bake for another 10 minutes or until cooked in the middle.
Filling
- 250ml Double Cream
- Fresh Strawberries
- Strawberry Jam (non seeded)
This bit is easy, simply whip up some double cream and fill the cooled shortbread tarts. Next cut up some strawberries in any style you like and place them on top. Finally melt a teaspoon of non-seeded strawberry jam with a little hot water and place over the top. You can now dust with a little icing sugar and repeat for the remaining tarts.
Serve immediately or refrigerate for later.
