Linzertorte

Clay and I have birthdays just two days apart, and this birthday week was very busy, so it took me a week or so afterwards to make his requested birthday dessert: linzertorte.

I'd never heard of linzertorte before. It's a tart with a crust that is largely made up of ground nuts. The recipe I used called for hazelnuts and a smaller amount of almonds. The filling is raspberry jam mixed with lemon juice.

This is by far one of the hardest things that I've ever baked and it went just fine. I was so proud of myself. I had such a hard time getting the skin off of the hazelnuts. It took forever even though I blanched them. Thank God for the food processor. This would have been an impossibility for me without it. The nuts are ground up super fine. There was also just a lot of cutting strips and freezing and STEPS, STEPS, STEPS! No one step was super complicated, but it was a long recipe.

Once the dough was made it was such a lovely consistency, super easy to roll out. It's not at all like pie crust.

Anyway, it was also super delicious, although so rich that I couldn't finish my slice above! After we enjoyed it we brought the leftovers out to a bar the next night to share with our friends. The recipe says that it's even better after a night in the fridge and I think they were right!

This was super delicious, but it's certainly something I'll only make for very special occasions.

Lemon Tarts

So I haven't made any pies in a while, but I did make these DELICIOUS lemon tarts for a book themed party my friend threw. They are Lemony Snicket tarts... heh heh heh. I am in love with these tarts. They are really rich.

This was my status update when I came home from shopping for these:

"I love it when it's super obvious from my shopping cart that I'm about to make something delicious: heavy cream, butter, confectioner's sugar, eggs, and 10 lemons."

There was quite a bit of hard work involved. You needed a crazy amount of lemon zest, like half a cup? Maybe more. 

I'm looking forward to making more pies this summer when berries go on sale.

Raspberry Tarts

I branched out recently and made tarts instead of a pie!

 I received these beautiful little scalloped tart pans as a wedding gift from an aunt. I love them! 

Two of our friends came over for brunch one day and they left behind 3 packages of raspberries, so I decided it would be a perfect opportunity to make raspberry tarts! 

I chose a recipe from the Cook's Illustrated Cookbook. The recipe for the crust was very worrisome. The book tells you to use a food processor, which we don't have. You are supposed to cut up the butter into pieces and then put it in the processor with the flour etc. I used a method that I learned from the Brown Eyed Baker where you grate the butter and then add it.  Anyway, the dough was extremely crumbly. There was no way on earth that I could roll it out like it says in the book.  So I improvised and just smooshed it into the tart pans.  Thank heavens, it turned out really delicious!

So for these tarts there are 3 components: (1) the crust, which you bake separately at first and then let cool before you add (2) the raspberries which you pack into each tart, and then (3) the filling which you pour over the raspberries and bake.

It looked so beautiful.

 

And presto chango! They are done!

 

When making tartlets as opposed to one large tart, be sure that you are checking them way before the time used for a 9 inch tart. When I baked the empty tart shells I checked them 10 minutes before the recipe said to and they were already quite a bit browner than I would have liked.

 Look at those beautiful scalloped edges. Glorious!

I gave two of the tarts to our friends who left the raspberries. They were pleased with the transformation.

I would definitely make these again. The raspberries were still tart which Clay and I both loved. It makes a very bright flavor. And also, tart is the name of the game!  Clay really wants me to try lemon tarts next.