Strawberry Cream Tart

 Last week we had friends round for dinner two nights in a row. To make life easier I decided to make tarts for dessert for both nights: the first one our favourite bakewell and the second a beautiful seasonal strawberry cream.



mounds of sweet-smelling strawberries

I had just received the latest copy of Cornucopia magazine, the exceptional publication for Turkey lovers, pricey but worth it, which had a beautiful section on strawberries: hence the inspiration. Some of the descriptions are so wonderfully evocative: İffet Evin wrote in Yaşadığım Boğazici/ The Bosphorus That I lived On, published in 1987 wrote ‘Oh, those Arnavutköy strawberries ...their scent used to waft to the other shore, as far as Vaniköy’.

‘She recalls as a child waking early in the morning to the scent of strawberries and the cry of strawberry sellers as they rowed across the Bosphorus to sell their fruit on the Asian side, where she lived.’

Can’t you just imagine it, see it, smell it?

These strawberries are still available, unremarkable in colour but unmistakable with their sweet fragrance  and sold by roadsides not from boats. A completely different species to their supermarket sisters of the bright red, perfectly-shaped variety which over the past few years have become available all year round. Being the purist that I am, I never buy those as honestly they are tasteless but wait for the local seasonal ones. They are red too because they are cultivated  and cross-bred to be ever-hardier but at least they taste!

The following recipe is for Strawberry Cream or Çilekli Krem, and can be used as a filling as I used it for a pre-cooked tart shell*.

strawberry cream tart

Ingredients for Çilekli Krem (pron: chi-lek-li krem)

A handful of ripe strawberries

3 egg yolks

7 tbsp sugar

3 tbsp plain flour

2 cups (50 cl) milk

Butter

Method

·         Rinse the strawberries and reserve a few of the best-looking ones for decoration. Hull the rest. Dry the fruit with a paper towel without bruising and set aside. If the strawberries are large, halve or quarter them.

·         In a deep pan whisk the egg yolks with the sugar. Add the sifted flour and mix. Pour the cold milk into the pan, whisking continuously to obtain a smooth texture.

·         Cook the mixture over a gentle heat, stirring until it begins to bubble and thicken. Simmer a little longer to allow the flour to cook completely.

·         Add the strawberries and a few knobs of butter to the hot cream, stir and leave to cool, covered, to allow the cream to absorb the intense flavour of the fruit.

·         Pour into the tart shell and smooth evenly. Decorate with the remaining stawberries. I added some toasted almonds as in the picture.

toasting a few flaked almonds in a pan

Tips

1.      Make your usual pastry or follow my earlier recipe, and use to line an 8in/20 cm tart dish . I am in love with my rectangular shape which I got from John Lewis last year. Easier to cut and serve from. Pastry keeps well in the fridge so long as it well covered. It also freezes brilliantly.

2.       It is important that the filling is cold when you pour it in otherwise the pastry will go soggy.

3.       This recipe by Berrin Torolsan in Cornucopia is just for a cream - the classic crème patissière  - which she suggests serving in an elegant bowl.  Be warned though, the amount here would only serve 2-4 max. However it is ideal for filling a tart.

BTW if you click on the pictures, they will enlarge!

Afiyet olsun!

removing pastry case from tin without it breaking!