Tiny Quark Pastry and Lime Curd Tarts

 



 

One should never bake when home alone is my new mantra.It's not good for the wasitline! As I sat down to write this blog every one of these tiny tarts gradually disappeared! Now that they have my personal seal of approval I plan to bake more for visitors during the festive season.

 

Quark is often used to make cheesecake.  But I wanted to create some delicate little sweet treats  which could be served as finger food.This would require pastry.

 

In my usual impetuous way I blitzed the butter and flour in my foodprocessor until they made fine crumbs , added the quark and blitzed it again just until a dough was formed.

The dough was quite soft so I flattened it into two discs and put them to chill for a few minutes in the freezer. Then I rolled each thinly between a couple of sheets of glad wrap. and cut the shapes out  with a little fluted cutter.

 

( you have to work fairly quickly but if the dough should become sticky you can put it back into the freezer for a few minutes, and/or sprinkle a little flour on the pastry)

I had greased a mini muffin pan ( a metal one, not silicone as I wanted the pastry to be crisp) and eased a cut out shape gently into the bottom of each mini muffin hole. The dough only came half way up the sides which is what I wanted as these would be tiny tarts.

Into a moderate oven they went for 10 minutes until they were golden . I lifted them out and put a large dab of Barker's Lime Curd in each one. They were delicious served warm. I think a good apricot jam like Anathoth apricot jam would have worked well as a filling for these too.

 

The quark I used was Hohepa Bio-dynamic Quark.

 

The Pastry:

 

Ingredients:

 

125 gram of Quark ( I used Hohepa)

125 gram of butter (straight out of the fridge and cubed)

125 gram of selfrasing flour

 

Method:

 

Preheat the oven to 180C

 

• Whizz the cold butter with the flour until small crumbs are formed.
• Add the quark and whizz just until the dough forms.
• Form it into two flat discs and rest in the freezer in some gladwrap for a few minutes to firm Then roll the dough out thinly between two sheets of gladwrap ( or on a bench on which a little flour has been sprinkled
• Using a small fluted cutter cut out shapes and ease each into a muffin pan.
• Bake for 10 minuts until  the little tarts are golden brow.
• Lift each little mini tart out of the tin before filling with a large dab of Barker's Lime Curd.