Mini Fruit Tarts
READ THIS FIRST: I recommend making your own pie dough, not store bought-it tastes way better and it's super easy to make! Fresh berries are best during the summer, so I tend to make this only during summertime unless someone instists. I usually use a combination of blackberry, raspberry and strawberry, but you should use your preference. This custard is such a cheat and I absolutely love it-none of the usual whisking over a double-boiler!
Ingredients
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- 2 batches pie dough
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- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
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- 2 tbsp corn starch
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- 4 egg yolks
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- 1 1/3 cup whole milk
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- 1/2 vanilla bean
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- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
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- 3 cups fresh berries
Directions
- In a medium bowl, thoroughly mix together sugar, corn starch, and egg yolks. the mixture should be a pale yellow, thin paste.
- Cut your vanilla bean in half, and split down the middle, exposing the seeds.
- Add milk to a medium saucepan, and add your vanilla bean. Bring to a simmer over low heat-it’s really important that you don’t scorch your milk!
- Remove the vanilla bean from the milk, and pour half of the milk mixture into the egg mixture-whisk thoroughly. This tempers your eggs so they don’t scramble when you heat them up.
- Pour the egg/milk mixture into the remaining milk mixture, continuing to heat while whisking constantly. Continue cooking and whisking until mixture is slightly bubbling and has a pudding-like texture. It’s really important to keep whisking or your custard will burn at the bottom of the pan, and the texture will be grainy.
- Remove from heat and stir in vanilla extract.
- Cover custard with a piece of parchment paper-it’s CRITICAL that the parchment paper makes full contact with your custard, so no skin forms while the custards cools. Press your parchment paper into your custard to accomplish this.
- Allow to cool fully, overnight in the refrigerator.
- Once your custard is fully cooled, grease your mini muffin pan and preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.
- Roll out your pie dough, cut into 2” circles and line the bottom of a mini muffin pan, pressing down slightly with your fingers. If you press down firmly enough, you won’t need to use pie weights.
- Bake for 14 minutes, until the pie crusts are a golden brown.
- While your pie crusts are cooling, strain your cooled custard-DO NOT skip this step, your custard will be mealy without it! ALWAYS STRAIN YOUR CUSTARD.
- Fill a piping bag with your custard, using a 1/4” opening or piping head. Pipe custard into pie shells-pie shells should be filled to the top of the shell.
- Cut berries lengthwise into 1/2 or 1/4, depending on the berry. I usually do half for the raspberries and blackberries, 1/4 for strawberries, but as strawberry size can vary quite a lot, sometimes I cut into more pieces. You’re going for presentation here, use your judgement.
- Arrange berries on top of the custard-filled pie shell, one piece of each berry per shell. I usually use 1/2 raspberry, 1/2 blackberry, and 1/4 strawberry, as in the picture.