Leek and Spinach Tart

This is one of my favourite "light meals" recipe. I spoke about Teresa Cutter before but honestly, this woman creates the best healthy clean recipes that are so nourishing for your body. I have made this tart a few times and even had it at my baby shower.

One of the reasons why I made this various times is because I have trouble removing tarts from tins. This version was one of the semi successful ones- but you can see it suffered some trauma. The filling is beautiful and the crust is so yummy though.

Some mistakes I made included
- Not oiling the tin enough
- Pressing the pastry too hard into the tin. Gentle pressing is sufficient.
-Not rolling the pastry evenly.
- Underbaking the crust.
- Using the wrong type of tart tin. I used the high wall type but found out that NOT all tins are created equal. Too thick a tin actually made it harder for the tart to be removed.

There was one week, that I was so frustrated, I made 3 tarts to prove that I can do it :x

Leek and Spinach Tart (Serves 10-12)
Crust
300 grams of Almond Meal
1 Cup of desiccated coconut or around 100grams
3 tablespoons of linseed
pinch salt
3 eggs

Filling
2 leeks
500 grams of spinach
500 grams of ricotta cheese
seasoning

Preheat Oven to 180C. Oil your tart tin VERY well. Blitz crust ingredients in the food processor. Roll pastry in between two pieces of baking paper and gently press it to the tin.

To make the filling, cook the leek with a little oil till soft. Add spinach till it wilts. Mix vegetables with ricotta and seasoning. Spoon into tart. Bake for 30 minutes. Serve with rocket and balsamic vinegar.

Pear and Coconut Almond Tart

Tarts are also associated with lovely crust and filling. I picked up this quick and easy recipe recently in a recently Donna Hay magazine. It isn't one of Donna's recipes- but in the advertisement section for pears! A quick glance shows that the base of this consists of a healthy dose of almond meal.

I thought about it for a few minutes and wonder how it would taste like with some coconut in it as well. The result is a thin base tart with the sweetness of pear in it. The cinnamon is certainly a very nice touch. Coconut added some texture to it.

The tart in the photos look dry but it didn't taste like it. I had it with a small scoop of vanilla ice-cream. It was satisfying.

Pear and Coconut Almond Tart
90 grams of butter
1/2 cup of brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp of vanilla extract
3/4 cup of almond meal
1/4 cup of desiccated coconut
1/4 tsp of baking powder
2 tsp of lemon rind
2 pears peeled cored and quartered
1/4 cup of golden syrup for brushing

Preheat Oven to 160C. Process butter and sugar in the food processor. Add eggs, vanilla, almond meal, coconut, baking powder, lemond rind and process til combined. Pour mixture into prepared fluted tart tin. Press pear quarters to the mixture. Bake for 40 minutes or till set. Brush with golden syrup and allow to cool in tin. Serve with cream or ice-cream if desired.

Salmon Carrot Quiche

Buying cheap sometimes mean that I am left to deal with the leftovers. At one point, I wasn't quite sure what to do with the remaining 5 pieces of puff pastry in the freezer.

Given that I'm frequently bringing sweet items to gatherings, I decided to bring something savory instead.

This quiche is certainly more eggy than the usual one you will have. I added some seeded mustard and it was beautiful. Carrots to make me feel like I am consuming 1 more serve of veges. What I like about this is the crisp pastry together with the eggyness wants you to have about! Abit like the savory version of egg tart. LOL It's quick to do too which is always a bonus.

Salmon Carrot Quiche
1 sheet of puff pastry
50 grams of smoked salmon
4 eggs
1/2 cup of Bega low fat cheese
1/2 cup of milk (Soy milk)
1 tsp of seeded mustard
1 shredded carrot
seasoning

Defrost pastry. Preheat Oven 200C. Line pan with pastry.Place slide smoked salmon randomly on pastry.

Beat 4 eggs and add cheese, milk and mustard. Season. Add carrot. Pour mixture into pastry case. Bake for 30 minutes.

Lemon Tart

I usually shy away from making pastry because I perceived them to be difficult, tricky, time consuming and unpredictable. The last thing I want is to make a tart and for pastry to fall off, or a base that is hard enough to break a person's tooth. Ah... the power of my imagination.

It turns out that to make a sweet shortcrust pastry isn't that hard. A few blitz in the food processing, resting in the fridge and tadah, ready to be rolled into the pastry tin. I used Donna Hay-because that is my "if this is new, look at Donnay Hay Classics" mantra. I think the pastry turned out slightly crisp but I would have preferred it to be slightly more crumbly. I might give Women's Weekly a go next time as their ratios of butter and flour seems slightly different to me (more butter I think).

I do like the filling! Nothing like a good citrus refreshing kick. The original recipe does not call for lemon zest, but since I have this lemon that I have squeezed, why waste the zest? I reduced the sugar slightly and even used a new product by Philadelphia- a low fat cream!!

My colleagues polished most of the tart off and I took 2 slices for AR. I did bring some fruits to go along with the tart, and cream of course. Since I was bringing it for office morning tea, I didn't cut a slice before packing it...and now I think the photo of it looks too plain! Definitely did not justify now lovely this tart was.

Lemon Tart

Short Crust Pastry
2 cups plain flour
3 tablespoons caster sugar
150 cold butter chopped
2-3 tablespoons iced water

Process flour, sugar and butter in food processor till it resembles breadcrumbs. While motor is running, add iced water till dough is formed. Turn dough out. Knead lightly. Wrap in pastry wrap and refrigerate for 30 mins.

Once dough is ready. Roll out between 2 sheets of baking paper, till around 2-3mm thick. Line the tart tin. Blind bake it (by placing baking paper, filling it with rice or baking beads) in preheated 180C oven for 10 mins. Remove beads and bake for another 10 mins till golden. Spoon filling in and bake again.


Lemon Tart Filling
3/4 cup of lemon juice (I used 1 and 1/2 lemons) and zest of it
1/2 cup of caster sugar (Was 3/4)
3/4 of pouring cream- I used Philadelphia low fat cream
3 eggs lightly beaten

Place lemon juice and sugar in heatproof bowl over simmering water. Stir till sugar dissolved. Add cream and eggs. Stir continously for 5 mins or so. Pour into tart shell through strainner. Bake tart for further 20-25 (mine took 25 mins) till filling is set. Cool and serve with cream or ice-cream.

Fruit Tarts

There are some food that you associate with breakups (i.e. chocolates), some that you associate with weddings (i.e. beautifully crafted cakes) and some that you associate with relationships. Well, I associate fruit tarts with time spent with my mother.

Growing up, I was never strong in my academic subjects. My parents enrolled me in numerous tuition class and never gave up encouraging me to do just slightly better. Every Sunday after church, my mother would encourage me to attend my English tuition by promising a nice lunch with her after tuition (plus window shopping of course). We would nearly always end up at Delifrance for some mother-daughter time and a fruit tart for me. Because mum works full time, those precious moments spent together were highly cherish by me, and I'm sure by my mum as well.

I love the custard that filled the sweet crust. The slight tang from the strawberries + kiwi fruit goes so well with the sweetness of the crust and custard. I remembered savoring every bite while mum and I chatted about tuition, school and shopping.

Well, so many years have past but my love for fruit tarts remain. I spotted Mrs Kwok's recipe and was impressed by how easy it seems to be...and so I thought! I underestimated the time and skill required to make these little beauties though and screwed up big time with the custard the first time round. Obviously, I did not heat the custard long enough and it was still watery. The 2nd time was better-but there wasn't enough custard to fill the tart shells! I quickly whipped up another batch of custard and that seem to be sufficient.

See how wet the custard was?

These babies aren't as pretty as the ones at Delifrance but bitting into one sure bring backs memories. Mum- fruit tart and lunch at Delifrance when I get back next year! =)



Fruit Tarts (4 large size tarts and 10 mini ones)

Custard Cream 4 tablespoon of corn flour
2 egg yolks
4 tbsp of sugar
200 ml of milk

Tart Shells
500 grams of cake flour
150 grams icing sugar
250 grams butter
2 large whole eggs

1) Custard- Combine egg ylk and corn flour. Whisk till ingredients combined. Add sugar into the yolk mixture and mix well. Warm milk on stove. Stir warmed milk gently into the egg yolk. Put the mixture back on low heat and keep stirring till it gets thicken (expect 10-15 minutes of stirring if not more). Chill.

2) Tart Shells- Cream butter and icing sugar. Add eggs. Fold in 2/3 flour by batches. Gather up dough and knead it genthly. Add remaining flour to make into a smooth dough. Roll dough in longular shape and cut into equal portion. (I cut 4 into big portions and 10 tiny ones). Shape dough into tart mould. Bake for 250 C in 180C preheated oven.

3) Assemble- Spoon custard cream into shell and top it with fruits. If you like, heat up some jam and glace the tarts.