sweet shortcrust pastry

Gregg Wallace fell in love with Michel Roux Snr's lemon tart at first bite. This is his version of the classic recipe

Gregg's tangy lemon tart

plain flour,plus extra for dusting

icing sugar

unsalted butter,cubed

eggs

caster sugar

milliliters double cream

juice 2-3 lemon(about 100 milliliters/3.5fl oz) and 2 tbsp lemon zest

To make the pastry, mix the flour and icing sugar in a bowl. Rub the butter into the flour with your fingers until crumbly. Mix in the egg yolks. If the pastry is still too dry, add 1-2 tbsp water until it comes together. Roll into a ball and divide in half (freeze one half for another recipe). Flatten out the pastry with your hands, wrap the dough in cling film, then chill for at least 30 mins. While the pastry is chilling, make the filling. Beat all the ingredients, except for the zest, together. Sieve the mixture, then stir in the zest.

Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface to about the thickness of a £1 coin, then lift into a 23cm tart tin. Press down gently on the bottom and sides, then trim off any excess pastry. Stab a few holes in the bottom with a fork and put back in the fridge for 30 mins.

Heat oven to 160C/140C fan/gas 3. Line the tart with foil and fill with rice or dried beans. Bake for 10 mins, then remove the tart tin from the oven, discard the foil, and bake for another 20 mins until biscuity. When the pastry is ready, remove it from the oven, pour in the lemon mixture and bake again for 30-35 mins until just set. Leave to cool, then remove the tart from the tin and serve at room temperature or chilled.

This simple Sweet Shortcrust Pastry is an amazingly easy to make shortbread type crust for all of your sweets, desserts, pies and tarts! It can be made entirely by hand, and doesn&#039;t even need to be rolled out for filling your pie or tart pans!

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

all-purpose flour

unsalted butter ((softened, at room temperature))

sugar

salt

tsp vanilla extract ((or almond extract))

beat butter and sugar

In a large mixing bowl, or the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the butter until softened. Add the sugar next and continue to beat until light and fluffy.

add egg

Gradually incorporate the egg and vanilla extract into your beaten butter and sugar.

add flour

Add the salt to a small bowl with the flour, stir to mix it in. Then add the flour to the buttery egg mixture, all at once. Combine until the flour is incorporated and you have a loose crumbled texture.

gather the crumble together

In the bowl, or turned out onto a clean working surface, gather the crumbled texture dough together and form into a ball. Wrap with plastic cling film wrap and flatten into a disc shape.

chill the dough

Chill the dough, either by refrigerating the wrapped dough for 30 minutes to an hour, or by placing the dough in your freezer. Chill in the freezer for only 10-20 minutes, or until the dough is firm (which will depend on the thickness of your formed disc).

Mixing the Dough

prepare tart pan

Choose a tart pan that will work best. Grease or coat the 8-9 inch tart pan with non-stick baking spray (oil and flour combination spray). *My preferred tart pan is metal, that also has a removable bottom. However, this sweet shortcrust pastry dough will form into any shape pan.

spread and shape the dough

Rolled Method: The dough can be rolled into an even layer about 10-11 inches in diameter, then transferred carefully over the tart pan. Allow the dough to loosely fill the tart pan, try to stretch the dough as little as possible to prevent shrinking while baking. Use your fingers to firmly press the dough into place along the pan edges.Pressed Method: The dough can be spread in the pan using your fingers. Pat the dough until it has an even bottom layer and sides are firmly pressed into place.

trim and dock

Trim the filled pastry edge or excess, either using a rolling pin (rolled over the top of the tart pan from one side to the other) or a sharp knife. Use a fork to prick, or &#039;dock,&#039; the shortcrust pastry dough. Doing this helps to leave space for filling as the pastry crust swells and puffs during baking.

chill

Once the dough is filled into the pan, trimmed and docked, cover it with plastic cling film and chill again. Place in the freezer for about 15 minutes while your oven preheats to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for blind baking. *You should place a sheet pan in the preheating oven for putting the tart pan on during blind baking as well.

Filling A Tart Pan

fill the crust

Remove the chilled pastry crust and cut a sheet of aluminum foil or parchment paper that is larger than your pie or tart pan. *Leave excess edges for ease of removal while the baked crust is still warm/hot. Fill the lined shortcrust pastry with pie weights, dried beans or rice. Use enough of whatever you&#039;re using as weights to hold down the paper and keep the dough from puffing while baking.

pre-bake

Bake the weighted shortcrust pastry dough on the preheated baking sheet in the center of your oven at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 15 minutes, or until the dough is about half-baked. *The parchment paper or aluminum should lift away easily, without sticking to the dough, when at this partially baked point.

Blind Bake

The perfect sweet shortcrust pastry or sweet pie crust is not hard to make if you follow the step-by-step recipe in this post.Homemade sweet pie dough makes all the difference, no matter what type of pie or tart you make!

How to make sweet shortcrust pastry

(120 grams) powdered sugar

(250 grams) all-purpose or cake flour

egg,

In a large bowl cream butter with a spatula or wooden spoon until it is smooth.

Add powdered sugar and mix until all is incorporated.

Add egg and mix with a fork. It will not be smooth or completely incorporated. That is fine.

Mix it but don’t wait until the flour is completely incorporated before adding the second half.

Now, mix it until lumpy and few dry spots remain.

Turn it out onto a clean surface or counter and mix with your hands, trying to make it come together but touching it as little as possible.

When you have a smooth dough ball, wrap it in plastic and refrigerate for at least 1 hour and up to 2 days.

When ready to roll, take the dough from the fridge and let barely soften at room temperature.

The dough must still be cold. Simply wait until you can start to roll it but not until it is very soft. This is important to ensure a tender dough.

On a lightly floured counter start rolling the dough disc, making sure you do quarter turns (I do them to the left) often to ensure the dough is not sticking and adding more flour to the counter if it is sticking.

Once you have the dough rolled a few inches larger than the pan, fold it in half and place the fold in the middle of the pan.

Open the dough and line the pan, being careful not to stretch the dough.

Use your hands to lower the dough and reach the union between the bottom and sides of the pie pan.

Go over the rim of the pan with the rolling pin to remove excess dough.

Prick the bottom with a fork and freeze for 20 minutes or put in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

At this point, you can leave the dough frozen in the pan for up to a month, wrapped in plastic.

Or you can blind bake it or bake it completely, depending on what you’re making. (Every pie or tart recipe in this blog has the steps to bake the pie crust. This post is about how to make and store the pastry).

How to prepare a pie crust for blind baking: take out the cold lined pie pan from the fridge or freezer.

Cut a piece of aluminum paper

that is larger than the tart pan. Line the inside of the pan by covering the cold dough with it and adjusting it so that it takes the shape of the dough. You can also use parchment paper, but it's usually coarser and more difficult to make it take the shape of the pan and cover the dough well.

Add weight

. I use round ceramic weights that you can buy online, but you can add any raw grains and legumes such as beans, lentils, rice or even flour (simply fill the aluminum paper with flour or rice or whatever you're using until you have added a layer of weight that will be enough to keep the paper down during baking.

Bake for 15 minutes

It might be a few minutes more or less depending on the type of pie crust, but the idea is to let the dough bake and dry out enough so that we can lift the aluminum paper without it attaching to the raw dough. The paper should lift easily and the dough below will be half baked, very lightly golden. Fill and bake further following instructions in the recipe for the tart or pie you're making.

To completely bake the shortcrust pastry: first, follow the steps to blind bake it, above.

After removing the paper and weight, return the pan to the oven and bake for another 10-15 minutes, depending on how golden you want it. The crust should be dry. Let cool on a wire rack.

If fully baked it will keep for a few days in a metal tin or at room temperature if the place is dry and cool.

But I suggest you bake it the day you’re filling it.

https://content.jwplatform.com/videos/H0t8NsSb.mp4

Make perfect sweet shortcrust pastry or sweet pie crust following the step-by-step recipe in this post.
A homemade crust makes all the difference!

How to make Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

This Pâte Sablée aka Sweet shortcrust pastry makes the perfect French tart crust to use for your favorite tartlets, be it be chocolate tart, lemon tart, or any fruit tart! 

The BEST Pâte Sablée, sweet shortcrust pastry

Icing sugar

Pastry flour (can be replaced with All purpose flour)

g Almond flour

butter

50 g Egg (approx. 1 egg)

Measure and cut butter into chunks and place it into the freezer for a few minutes

Sift together dry ingredients; flour, icing sugar, almond, salt

Add very cold butter chunks into the dry ingredients, and rub the mixture between your hands until it becomes a sand-like consistency

Add egg into the mixture and mix with your hands just until the dough comes together

Knead the dough with the palm of your hand for a minute or two, just until the dough becomes smooth. Do not over-knead the dough and do not use mixer, neither a food processor

If the dough is too warm and sticky, place it into the fridge for 10-15 minutes first.  Otherwise, continue with rolling the dough out into 2mm thickness between two Silicone baking mat.

Place the dough into the freezer for 15 min in between the two Silicone baking mat.. Do not remove the mat at this point

Prepare your oven rack with the Perforated &quot;air&quot; baking mat and Perforated tart rings on top

Take the dough out from the freezer, remove the top of the silicone mat and using one of the Perforated tart rings, cut out 8 circles - this will be the bottom of your tart. Carefully move the dough circles with the help of an Offset spatula and place them into the rings one by one

If at any point the dough gets too warm to work with, pop it back into the freezer for 5 minutes. You might need take the dough in and out of the freezer many times depending on the temperature of your kitchen. It is extremely important to work with a dough which is cold enough to be able to handle (so not sticky) but not too cold which would result in breaking it

Cut 8 long strips out of the dough, this will be the side of the tart

Carefully place the strips into the ring one by one. Press each strip onto the ring so it sticks to it

Place the Perforated tart ring with the pastry dough in them into the freezer for 1 hour

Pre-heat the oven to 160C / 320F

After 1 hour, trim the top of the pastry with a sharp knife

Bake for 20 min, then carefully remove the rings and bake for another 5 -10 min until golden brown. At the 20 min mark the pastry should be already somewhat baked and therefore will contract within the ring. If the pastry feels stuck into the ring, bake it for further 1-2 minutes

Let the pastry cases cool on the Perforated &quot;air&quot; baking mat before filling

https://embed.mediavine.com/videos/ckks32pzay7bgfnlpo4e

This Pâte Sablée aka Sweet shortcrust pastry makes the perfect French tart shells to use for your favorite tartlets, be it be chocolate tart, lemon tart, or any fruit tart! Pâte Sablée is a delicious, buttery shortcrust that is sweet but not too sweet, a melt-in-the-mouth pastry dough that can turn any dessert into fancy French patisserie-like goodness!

Pâte Sablée (Sweet shortcrust pastry)

Learn how to make deliciously sweet shortcrust pastry - it&#039;s so easy! Just 4 basic ingredients and 5 minutes prep time... it couldn&#039;t be any simpler!

How To Make Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

300 g (2 cups) plain flour

tbs caster sugar (superfine sugar)

2-3 tbs icy cold water (see notes)

Place the flour, sugar and butter into a food processor and process it until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Slowly adding the iced water until a smooth dough forms (add a little extra iced water if the mixture is too crumbly).

Knead the dough into a ball on a lightly floured surface.

Wrap in plastic wrap and place it into the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

When you're ready to use your dough, roll it out on a lightly floured surface with a rolling pin until it is 3mm thick.

If you're making a pie or dessert that has both a pastry bottom and top, it's best to divide your dough into 2 and roll them out separately.

Bake the pastry in an oven preheated to 180 degrees celsius for approximately 20 minutes or until lightly golden and crisp.

Please note that if you&#39;re not adding the pie/dessert filling immediately, place a sheet of baking paper over the bottom of the pastry and fill with baking weights or rice (uncooked) before placing into the oven. Remove the paper and weights halfway through the baking time.

Conventional Method

Place the flour, sugar and butter into the TM bowl and mix for 10 seconds on Speed 6 (or until it resembles fine breadcrumbs).

Add the iced water and knead for 1 minute on Interval speed, or until the dough comes together (add a little extra iced water if the mixture is too crumbly).

Top 6 sweet shortcrust pastry recipes from across the web

The most viewed sweet shortcrust pastry recipes by Recipe Cart users, saved from over 6,000 sites. Or, go to our Recipe Search Engine

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Gregg's tangy lemon tart

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

How to make sweet shortcrust pastry

The BEST Pâte Sablée, sweet shortcr...

How To Make Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

Top 6 sweet shortcrust pastry recipes from across the web

The most viewed sweet shortcrust pastry recipes by Recipe Cart users, saved from over 6,000 sites. Or, go to our Recipe Search Engineic_arrow_forward_48px

Top Tags

Gregg's tangy lemon tart

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

How to make sweet shortcrust pastry

The BEST Pâte Sablée, sweet shortcr...

How To Make Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

The most viewed sweet shortcrust pastry recipes by Recipe Cart users, saved from over 6,000 sites. Or, go to our Recipe Search Engine