Custard tart with raspberry coulis

Paul Gregory

Ingredients

Sweet pastry case

• 175 g (6 oz) butter
• 75 g (3 oz) icing sugar
• 3 egg yolks
• 250 g (9 oz) plain flour

Custard filling

• 260 ml (½ pt) single cream
• 75 ml (3 fl oz) full fat milk
• 2 large eggs
• 2 egg yolks
• 50 g (2 oz) caster sugar
• Fresh grated nutmeg

Raspberry Coulis

• 200 g (7 oz) raspberries
• 2 tablespoons (25 g or 1 oz) icing sugar

Special Equipment

• 8 inch, fluted, loose based flan case

Method

Sweet pastry case

1. Cream together the butter and sugar.
2. Add the egg yolks and beat well.
3. Add the flour and beat for 2 minutes. Leave to chill for 1 hour in the fridge.
4. Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
5. Roll out the pastry and line the base of the flan case. Bake blind by pricking the pastry case all over. Line with some rice or dried beans to prevent the pastry case from rising and bake for 20 minutes.
6. A few minutes before the end, remove the rice or beans and put the pastry case back in the oven to allow it to crispen up.

Custard filling

1. Put the cream and milk in a pan and bring up to a gentle simmer (do not allow it to boil).
2. Whisk together the eggs, egg yolks and caster sugar.
3. Pour the milk and cream mixture into the eggs and sugar and stir it in.
4. Strain it through a sieve into a jug.
5. Pour the custard filling into the sweet pastry case and grate a very small amount of nutmeg over it.
6. Bake at 130°C/275°F/gas mark 1 for 35 minutes.
7. Leave to cool and serve with raspberry coulis.

Raspberry coulis

1. Heat 150 g (5 oz) of the raspberries in a pan.
2. Add the icing sugar and, when dissolved, remove the pan from the heat and whisk it carefully.
3. Mix in the remaining whole raspberries and serve with the custard tart.

Did you know?

The key to cooking is to remember to always add the HOT ingredients to the COLD (for example add hot milk to the cold egg in making the custard tart). If you do it the other way round, when the first drop of cold egg hits the hot milk/cream mixture it will cook, causing curdling.