Mandarin & Lime Tart

This is a spin of the classic lemon pie and it came about when I had the desire to make a lemon pie but it was no lemons in the house or in the tree but there were plenty of limes and a few mandarins!

I like to do an Italian meringue on top, but if you don’t have the time, you could easily serve the tart with a dollop of Crème fraîche or double cream.

Curd

3 eggs
5 yolks
2 mandarin zested and juiced
3 limes zested and juiced
175 gr sugar
150 gr butter

Pastry
350 gr plain flour
225 gr butter cubed
100 gr icing sugar
3 egg yolks
1 pinch of salt

For the pastry, crumb butter with flour and sugar, 

I use my food processor, then add yolks until all is well combined. Refrigerate until fairly hard then using the coarse part of a grater, grate pastry as you do with a piece of cheese and press pastry into a tart shell (you will have some pastry leftover that you can wrap and freeze for further use).

Blind bake at 200ºC for 15 mins, take the weights and bake for a further 5 mins.

To make curd, combine sugar, zest and juice of mandarins and limes and the eggs in a shallow pot. Place on high heat and using a  whisk, continuously in order to prevent crust forming, add half the butter and keep stirring with whisk until dissolved, then add the other half and continue to stir until it thickens up.

Place curd on the cooked tart shell. If you don't want to do a meringue, place the tart under a grill until you get a few nice little burned spots and serve with creme fraiche or double cream.

If you have the time and desire make some italian meringue let the curd cool down then top up with meringue and blow torch. (You can use your own meringue recipe for this.)