Strawberry Cream Cheese Tarts
By: Tanya Kohli
Published: Friday, January 20, 2012 - 1:08am

Ingredients




200g flour
115g butter, melted
85g sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon vanilla (am fearful of the egg smell!)
1 tablespoon milk
1 egg yolk
For the Filling,
200g Thick Cream (available in Tetra Packs or double cream in case you have access to it)
1 Heaped Tablespoon of Goats cheese (Use cream cheese as an alternative)
4 Tablespoons Sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon milk (optional)
2-3 Crushed Strawberries or mixed berries
150g chopped strawberries or mixed berries to garnish.
Chopped Kiwi for garnishing

Preparation

1 In a large bowl, sift together the flour, butter and sugar to get a crumbly mixture. 2 Add the egg yolk, cinnamon and vanilla and make dough. 3 Keep the dough wrapped in cling film in the fridge for about 30 minutes. 4 Line tart tins with the dough and line the dough with foil or fill with beans. 5 Bake at about 180 degrees C, for about 15 minutes with the foil or until golden brown and for about 2-3 minutes without the foil. 6 Remove the tray from the oven and let the tarts cool. 7 Soften the cheese, by keeping at room temperature for about 30 minutes. Add the cream, sugar, cinnamon and berries. Let the mixture cool in the fridge for about 20 minutes. Fill into the tarts and top with chopped strawberries. 8 p.s. I grease the tart tins very lightly to ensure that they don’t break while removing.

About

The dish was decided, I was going to make tartlets with strawberries and cream. I decided to go back to the Ipad Baking App, which I totally swear by. I used the tart recipe here, removed the almonds from it, and added some cinnamon instead. Most often, tarts are made with fresh fruits, and the mixed berry tarts seen so often are almost impossible to make here- no wild berries or blackberries available easily and I didn’t want to go down the tinned variety route. For the filling, I experimented a bit and decided to use a combination of cream and cheese- next time I may just use cream cheese instead! I had the wonderful goat’s cheese with cinnamon and berries still lying in the fridge, and so I decided to use a bit of it and hence, added the cinnamon in the tart base to compliment the cheese. The results were astonishing. The goat’s cheese added a wonderful consistency and flavor to the filling, a glimpse of cranberries and the slightly cheesy sweetness with a hint of cinnamon was quite wintery. I always thought strawberries and cream was a winner; the discovery of the addition of cinnamon has been interesting. The audience thought it was quite professional, and during the delay in actually putting up the post, I have already made the tarts twice over.