Impress your friends and flatmates with this delicious Strawberry Tart recipe! Consisting of a buttery shortcrust pastry base, light Chantilly cream filling topped with fresh strawberries and a sweet homemade strawberry sauce. Tuck into this perfect sweet treat while you’re watching the new season of The Great British Bake Off on Tuesday, 24 September.
This recipe is for creating one large tart, but you can divide the quantities across multiple smaller tarts too.
Prep time: Two hours
Cooking time: 30 minutes
Skill Level: Beginner
Makes: One large nine” tart or around six smaller tarts
Ingredients
Pastry
- Jus-Rol Shortcrust Pastry Ready Rolled Sheet 320g (Or use an alternative shortcrust recipe of your choice)
Chantilly Cream Filling
- 15g Icing Sugar (sifted)
- 300ml Double Cream
- 1 Teaspoon (tsp) Vanilla Extract
Decoration
- 400g Strawberries
- Lemon Juice for flavour
- 1 tsp Cornflour
- 2 Tablespoons (tbsp) Water
- 100g Granulated Sugar
Method
Step One: Preheat your oven to 180°C (160°C for a fan oven). Line a tart tin size of your choice with the pastry, using a sharp knife to cut off the excess pastry around the edges. I prefer to use a 9-inch tart tin.
Step Two: Next, you must ‘blind bake’ your pastry. This ensures that the pastry is cooked properly throughout, preventing it from either burning or being raw and preventing the pastry from puffing up inside. I prefer to use either ceramic baking beans from Lakeland or you can use uncooked rice too. Blind bake for around 10-15 minutes or until golden brown. Once baked, leave aside to cool.
Step Three: Whilst the pastry base is cooking and cooling, let’s get started on making the strawberry sauce for decoration as this needs to cool down ahead of assembling the tart.
To begin, add 200g chopped strawberries, 100g sugar, a squeeze of lemon juice and water to a small pan on high heat. Stir the ingredients together and bring it to a boil.
Step Four: Once bubbling, reduce the heat to a low temperature and leave to simmer for around ten minutes. This will give you time for the strawberries to soften and the sauce to become thicker. If you wish for an even thicker sauce, you can remove the sauce from the cooker and blend the mixture together using a handheld blender.
Step Five: To separate the sauce liquid from the cooked strawberries, strain the mixture through a strainer and then pour the liquid into a small pan on a low heat to keep warm.
In a separate small bowl, mix 1 teaspoon of cornflour with one tablespoon of water and pour this combined mixture into the strawberry sauce and stir.
Step Six: As the sauce mixture is thickening, slowly increase the temperature and continue stirring. Once you are satisfied with the consistency, remove the pan from the heat and pour the sauce into a small bowl to cool down.
Step Seven: While the strawberry sauce is cooling down, let’s make the cream filling. I prefer to use Chantilly cream as it is easy to make and tastes super sweet!
Begin by whipping together the double cream, icing sugar and vanilla extract into a cold large bowl. You can either do this by hand or use an electrical stand/hand whisk on a medium to high speed. Continue to whip until firm peaks have formed. The consistency should hold its shape when the beater is removed from the mixture and does not fall off the whisk.
Step Eight: Now it is time to assemble. Begin by lining your pastry tart with the fluffy Chantilly cream filling. You can either spread this on top or pipe. Next, place a layer of fresh strawberries on top of the cream filling. You can either add them whole or cut them into slices and arrange them into a pattern. Finally, top the tart with the delicious strawberry sauce mixture, ensuring to cover over the top of the strawberries.
Top Tips!
- It is best to use the Pre-rolled shortcrust pastry at room temperature. I recommend taking the packet out of the fridge around 45 minutes before you plan to bake.
- A thick strawberry sauce is recommended to prevent the tarts from becoming too messy to eat, as a thinner sauce will spill over the pastry edges.
- For a vibrant red-coloured strawberry sauce, you can add a few drops of red food colouring to make the colour pop! (I promise this isn’t cheating…)
- Take your time when whipping together the cream filling as it can be easy to overbeat! Over beating the mixture will loosen the cream, making it difficult to pour into the tart pastry fillings neatly.
If you wish to watch a video on how I created my Strawberry Tart, click here to view the Reel on Tiktok!
Featured image credit: Chloe Edwards
I am a 4th Year Marketing Student, on a journey to pursue a career in Marketing, PR or Social Media, particularly in the Food & Beverage (F&B) industry. My creative background includes collaborations with brands such as Boots UK, Hobbycraft and JF Renshaw through creating Hyper-realistic Cakes.
