This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie resulted in forced creativity. Sometimes creativity comes from an inspired idea and other times it’s just a necessity to compensate for a missing ingredient, often rooted in the lack of desire to go to the store and purchase said ingredient.

In reading over this week’s recipe it was clear that the 2 tablespoons of dark rum was a key flavor of the finished product. After a thorough inspection of my hooch collection, my suspicion was confirmed; I didn’t have dark rum. A slightly annoying problem because I can’t just add dark rum to my grocery list, in Washington State acquiring such a substance means a special trip to a state-run liquor store. A task I wasn’t willing to add to my day, so I began working on a creative solution.

Dark rum has a spicy rich flavor which brought allspice immediately to mind as a good alternative. Rather than just adding ground allspice I thought I could achieve a deeper flavor by infusing it in the hot milk called for in the recipe. Because I was going the spice route I decided to boost the suggested pinch of coriander and infuse it along with the allspice. I made  half a batch of custard, so for 1 cup of milk I used 1 teaspoon each of whole allspice and coriander seeds that were simply crushed to open them up. After heating the milk to just below a boil, I removed it from the burner, added the crushed spices, covered the pan, and let it infuse for 10-15 minutes. Once strained, I moved on with the recipe as written.

The aroma wafting from the milk was a heady spicy sweet scent that assured me my Toasted-Coconut Custard Tart wasn’t going to be lacking in any way by the absence of dark rum. The flavor combined with the creamy custard texture reminds me of eggnog. This would be a fantastic holiday tart. The color of the custard is a bit unfortunate, but draped with a blanket of billowy white whipped cream, it’s hardly a problem.

Whenever a recipe just uses coconut flakes I never pick up much coconut flavor, but find the real contribution of the coconut to be textural. I found this to be the case here as well especially because the allspice flavor was so dominate. I only added the coconut to half of the individual tartlets I made and prefered the no-coconut version. I wish I had thought to add the coconut to the crust, where I think it would have been better represented. Next time.

A quick note on the crust, it’s a pâte sablée style of crust which is very buttery and crisp much like a shortbread cookie rather than a pie crust type crust. With the aid of a food processor it’s a snap to make and this style of dough is simply pressed into the tart pan rather than needing to be rolled out.  If you are looking for a versatile tart dough, Dorie Greenspan has the recipe posted on her site as part of her French Pear Tart recipe. I was a little short on butter and added in some of my home-rendered lard, I keep on hand for pie crusts, with great results.

Thank you to Beryl of Cinnamon Girl for this week’s recipe pick. Visit her blog for the Toasted-Coconut Custard recipe. I think I will be making my allspice version again during the holidays.

Over 350 baking bloggers are baking our way thorough Dorie Greenspan’s book, Baking: From My Home to Yours . 115 recipes completed 106 to go!