Luscious Lemon Curd and Pastry Cream Tart

Directions

*You will need a removable bottomed, 9 inch tart pan for this recipe.

I made the crust in my food processor, but you can use a mixer if you don’t have one.  Just be very careful not to over work the dough or it will be very tough.

In the bowl of your mixer or processor, add in all of the dry ingredients and pulse or blend until combined.  Add in the wet ingredients and mix until the dough comes together.  Flatten into a disk, cover with plastic wrap and chill for an hour in the fridge.

Make the pastry cream while the dough is chilling.

Combine the milk, cream and half of the sugar in a medium sauce pan over medium high heat, stirring occasionally until the mixture comes to a simmer.

As the mixture heats up, in another bowl, whisk together the remaining sugar, egg yolks, salt and cornstarch.  Whisk by hand until light and creamy.

Once the milk mixture is hot, slowly whisk in about a cup of the liquid into the egg yolk mixture. This step is called tempering, and it will prevent the eggs from scrambling by slowly heating them to temperature.

Pour the tempered mixture back into the hot milk mixture and reduce the heat to medium, continuing to cook while constantly whisking. The mixture will get thick very quickly and should only take less than a minute.  Remove from the heat and add in your cold butter and vanilla. Whisk until smooth and creamy.

Transfer the custard into another bowl and place a piece of plastic wrap directly on top of it to prevent a skin from forming.

Chill for several hours or until it is completely cooled.

By this time, your dough should be chilled enough to roll out.

Heat your oven to 350 degrees.

On a floured surface, roll your tart shell dough until it is a few inches larger than your tart pan.

Gently roll the dough over your rolling pin and place the dough into the pan very carefully.

Take your rolling pin and roll over the top to trim off the excess dough.

Place a piece of parchment or foil inside the tart shell and fill with dried beans or pie weights to blind bake the crust.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes with the beans inside the foil or parchment. This is known as blind baking. This keeps your dough from puffing up in the middle.

Take the tart from the oven and carefully remove the foil or parchment and the dried beans.

Place back in the oven and bake for another 10 to 12 minutes, or until the tart is lightly golden brown.

Cool completely then remove from the pan.

Make sure the tart is completely cooled before filling it with the pastry cream.

When the pastry cream is completely chilled, spread into your cooled tart shell.

Dollop as much lemon curd as you like on top, then create a design.  See the above pictures 🙂

Add any kind of berries on top that you love.

Chill the tart before serving.

Keep in the fridge for a few days covered in plastic wrap!

Enjoy this scrumptious treat!! xo