Attempting to Tart Things Up
I love food! I love experiencing new flavors. I love experimenting with recipes. I love cooking for friends and family. Whenever a situation has become too overwhelming for me, I usually retreat to the kitchen, pull out a cookbook, and try a new recipe. This is how I have managed to create an incredible manicotti, bake the perfect cheesecake and recreate my Gran’s Aebleskivers. The down side of this outlet is that I am also an emotional eater, so I have to rely on my friends to not only taste test for me, but also take any leftovers home with them.
This weekend was my first attempt at making mini tarts. It was a no brainer for me to decide that lemon tarts were the way to go. Lemon has always been my preferred choice of flavor for pastries. It was also the most popular flavor when I searched for recipes online; who am I to argue? After searching for recipes online and through my cookbooks, I decided that I would try the shell of one recipe from the Taste of Home Baking Book. The lemon curd recipe came from my trusty and well used Betty Crocker Cookbook.
The shell recipe was rather simple to follow. The ingredient that I found the most interesting, and therefore made me choose this recipe, was the finely chopped almonds. It added not only an extra and interesting flavor and texture to the shell, but also helped create a shortbread cookie flavor. There were a couple of technical problems in forming and baking the shells: 1) I should have chilled the dough a little before I tried to mold the dough into the shells; 2) I ended up having to make the shells bigger than I intended due to a flawed plan and poor advanced planning. These are problems I will fine tune on my next attempt.
The lemon curd recipe was my favorite part of this trial. It was like a chemistry experiment what with the heating and stirring to induce thickening. And I also got to use my awesome microplane (yes, I’m a kitchen appliance/tool dork) to zest a lemon! I have to admit that I cheated while making the lemon curd. Rather than sit and juice 5 or 6 lemons in order to get one full cup of juice, I used store bought juice. It was too late at night and I was too lazy to attempt putting that much effort in my first trial. To make matters worse, I then proceeded with the recipe for the filling that was in the Betty Crocker Cookbook, which directed me to combine ½ cup of the prepared curd with 8 ounces of softened cream cheese. Unfortunately, the filling, once combined and chilled to set, had a nasty, soured dairy flavor. I will not repeat the cream cheese step of this recipe. I also learned my lesson and will squeeze the lemon juice myself rather than try and take the easy way out.
This weekend was my first attempt at making mini tarts. It was a no brainer for me to decide that lemon tarts were the way to go. Lemon has always been my preferred choice of flavor for pastries. It was also the most popular flavor when I searched for recipes online; who am I to argue? After searching for recipes online and through my cookbooks, I decided that I would try the shell of one recipe from the Taste of Home Baking Book. The lemon curd recipe came from my trusty and well used Betty Crocker Cookbook.
The shell recipe was rather simple to follow. The ingredient that I found the most interesting, and therefore made me choose this recipe, was the finely chopped almonds. It added not only an extra and interesting flavor and texture to the shell, but also helped create a shortbread cookie flavor. There were a couple of technical problems in forming and baking the shells: 1) I should have chilled the dough a little before I tried to mold the dough into the shells; 2) I ended up having to make the shells bigger than I intended due to a flawed plan and poor advanced planning. These are problems I will fine tune on my next attempt.
The lemon curd recipe was my favorite part of this trial. It was like a chemistry experiment what with the heating and stirring to induce thickening. And I also got to use my awesome microplane (yes, I’m a kitchen appliance/tool dork) to zest a lemon! I have to admit that I cheated while making the lemon curd. Rather than sit and juice 5 or 6 lemons in order to get one full cup of juice, I used store bought juice. It was too late at night and I was too lazy to attempt putting that much effort in my first trial. To make matters worse, I then proceeded with the recipe for the filling that was in the Betty Crocker Cookbook, which directed me to combine ½ cup of the prepared curd with 8 ounces of softened cream cheese. Unfortunately, the filling, once combined and chilled to set, had a nasty, soured dairy flavor. I will not repeat the cream cheese step of this recipe. I also learned my lesson and will squeeze the lemon juice myself rather than try and take the easy way out.