A simple berry tart could be the perfect summer dessert. What better way is there to showcase fresh colorful juicy berries at their peak of ripeness than with a rich creamy vanilla custard and a buttery crisp crust?
The Tuesday with Dorie group got a jump on summer with Dorie’s Quick Classic Berry Tart. The early start on summer limited my berry selection to strawberries so I decided to toss in some of the gorgeous locally grown rhubarb that is showing up at the markets lately and an exotic spice from the land down under.
My local spice shop gave me a sample of Tasmanian pepperberry that they will soon be stocking. Pepper is a great match in many deserts as Gale Gand shares in our Spice Inspiration feature, so I thought this might be the perfect place to experiment with this new spice. No surprise it grows in Tasmania and can be found growing wild in the rainforests, but has not been readily available outside of Australia until recently. It has a warm woody minty aroma that is sweet and inviting and a little deceptive given the very hot peppery kick that builds at the end. Like Sichuan pepper, pepperberries have a slight numbing sensation on the tongue.
For the rhubarb I started by simmering 1 cup of plum wine, ½ cup of sugar and ½ teaspoon of Tasmanian pepperberry until the liquid reduced by about ¼. Then I added 3 ribs of rhubarb, chopped into 1-inch pieces, and let it simmer for about 5 minutes uncovered. Once the rhubarb was soft I removed it from the pan and continued to reduce the liquid to about ½ cup and strained it. I tossed the sliced fresh berries in the reduced liquid, layered the rhubarb and berries on the tart, topped with a sprinkle of freshly ground pepperberry and mint completed my creation.
In general it was fantastic, but my experiments did leave me with a list of changes for next time. Dories simple tart dough is always a winner and for this tart I substituted a bit of almond flour for all-purpose flour with a good result. The syrup on the berries turned out to be a little sweet for me. I cooked down the left over syrup with some extra sugar to a nice thick jam that I drizzled over the top, which turned out to be unnecessary. The next time I make this, a port or red wine will be my choice over the very sweet plum wine, which I used just because I had it on hand from another recipe. A ½ teaspoon of pepperberry in the crust would be a nice way to add another layer of the spice flavor to the tart. Due to timing challenges I mixed the berries with the syrup, but did not assemble the tart until the next day so the berries were very macerated and I think a firmer texture of freshly sliced berries would be an improvement.
It’s really hard to beat a beautiful berry tart and even though there are things I will change the next time I make this, it was delicious and the Tasmanian pepperberry added an exciting flavor twist. As soon as summer berries hit your market, visit Christine of Cooking with Christine for this Quick Classic Berry Tart recipe and celebrate the season.
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how deliciously springtime! i bought a handful pepperberries once while we were living in Sydney. I can’t remember now how i used them up, but i do remember their spicy kick!