Cherry and almond tart
Nothing quite like fresh cherries right off the tree in the summer. This years’ crop were really dark and sweet.
For this recipe you can substitute cherry jam for strawberry, something else similar, and add alcohol such as kirsch to the filling.
Also, if you prefer fresh cherries rather than baked, cook the pastry case with the almond filling before adding the cherries and glazing, and then just leave to cool.
One great tip for rolling very rich pastry is to roll it between two sheets of cling film. This way you can get it to a few mm in thickness without worrying too much about it breaking, and you can very easily transfer it to your baking tin too.
Also, don’t trim the edges of your pastry until after you have baked it. Then take a very sharp knife and trim to the top edge, or the lip edge of your tin, depending how much you like pastry! If you do it before you bake it, it will most likely shrink away from the tin.
- For the pastry
- 200g plain flour
- 100g butter
- 15g caster sugar
- 1 egg, beaten
- 15ml warm water
- For the filling
- 140g ground almonds
- 140g butter, melted
- 140g caster sugar
- 1 egg, and 1 egg yolk, beaten
- 500g cherries, stoned
- 30g cherry jam
- 30ml water
- Mix all pastry ingredients except water. Then gradually add water to form a soft pastry dough.
- Wrap the pastry and refrigerate while you make the filling.
- Mix the almonds, butter, sugar, and eggs to form a thick paste. Refrigerate for 20-30 minutes.
- Preheat your oven to 160 degrees.
- Roll out your pastry and line a loose-bottomed tart tin. Prick the bottom of the pastry with a fork.
- Line the pastry with foil and use baking beans or similar (I used barley) to weight it down.
- Bake for 15 minutes. Remove the foil and bake again for 10 minutes or until golden.
- Spread the almond paste evenly over the base, and cover with cherries.
- In a sauce pan heat the jam and water, and reduce into a smooth glaze. Brush over the tart.
- Bake for a further 25 – 35 minutes, or until the filling has set in the middle of the tart. Cool for 10 minutes before eating.
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