Really into bakery stuffs lately - searching for recipes online, buying the baking ingredients and utensils. Anyway, the lucky ones (hubby and flatmate) get to try my end products.
Ok, here comes the recipe for the delicious egg tarts (adapted from Christine's recipe).
(I consider this recipe easy cos I succeed at the first attempt. Mind you, I only start baking recently. I'm a beginner in this baking community *v*)
My first baked tart
Ingredients (for the crust):
225g plain flour
125g butter
55g icing sugar
1 egg, whisked
a dash of vanilla extract
Ingredients (for the custard):
3 eggs
110g castor sugar
225g hot water
85g evaporated milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Method (making crust):
- Place the butter at the room temperature until softened (if you stay in cold country like me, you better melt it using the stove or microwave cos this is faster). Cream the butter and sugar with an electric mixer over medium speed until the mixture is smooth, fluffy and light in colour.
- Add in the whisked egg, half at a time, beat over low speed. Add vanilla extract and mix it well.
- Sift in flour in 2 batches, make sure all ingredients combine well. Knead into a dough.
- Roll out the dough to a 1/2 cm thickness. Cut the dough with a cookie cutter (a bit smaller than your tart tin - I use the cover of my hot cocoa. Haha. No need purposely to go out and buy a cookie cutter).
- Line the dough in the middle of the tart tins. Lightly press dough with your thumbs (I use my fingers as well), starting from bottom then up to the sides. Trim away any excess dough (using a small spoon).
The unbaked crust
Method (making custard):
- Add the castor sugar into the hot water, stir it (using a spoon) until everything is dissolved completely.
- Whisk egg with the evaporated milk. Pour in the sugar water (from the step 1). Mix well.
- Sift egg mixture to get rid of any foam into a tea pot. Carefully pour egg mixture into each tart tins. (If you don't have any teapot, you can also sift the egg mixture into a large bowl and use a spoon to scoop it out for the tart tins)
They are ready to be put into the oven
Method (baking tarts):
- Preheat oven to 200°C. Position the rack in lower 3rd of the oven (so the tart base is cooked well before the custard puffs up). As for my oven, it will turn on the heater for the top and bottom when I select the "baking mode" - the same type of oven used by Christine.
- Bake for 10 - 15 minutes until the edges are lightly brown (I use 15 minutes)
- Lower the heat to 180°C. You have to observe the tarts properly now. Once you see the custard puffs up a bit, pull the oven door open about 2 to 3 inches. Bake for another 10 minutes until the custard is cooked through. Just insert a toothpick into the custard. If it stands on its own, then it is ready to be taken out.
See, the custard is puffing up and it looks like it is going to explode
(Don't be scared cos it won't once you open the oven door as instructed above)
The puffing tarts (they will cool down and sink down after awhile)
This is the first tray of my tarts (they taste really nice though they don't look perfect)
The total tarts I made using this recipe: 16
The leftover custard : about 200ml (shall make the crust again tomorrow or just steam it as desert)
Enjoy eating these tarts while they are hot. Yummy delicious. Not too sweet, just nice ^^
