Pecans are one of my favorite nuts and pecan pie is definitely a holiday classic, but even though I enjoy a slice from time to time, pecan pie tends to be a little too gooey and a little too rich much of the time - especially after a big meal. If you like a less gooey dessert, as I do with pecan pie, you might want to try a pecan tart instead. With the tart, you get the crunch of the nuts along with just the right amount of sticky, caramely filling in each slice.

Many versions of pecan pie use corn syrup as a sweetener and as the base for their filling. I’m not a big fan of this approach (corn syrup has a place, but not in my pies), so starting last year I set out to experiment with some different sweeteners in pecan pie. For instance, last year I made a Maple Pecan Pie for Thanksgiving. The flavor combination was great, but there are plenty of other options for sweets that go with pecans, so I ended up making a Honey Pecan Tart this time around.

The tart is a lot like a pecan pie, with a generous base of pecans. Honey is naturally very sweet, so I used roasted and salted pecans for this pie and the flavor balance turned out to be absolutely perfect. There is some additional sugar in the filling, as well as some eggs, butter and a little bit of flour to bind everything together. The tart bakes and cools more quickly than a regular pecan pie and can be made a day or two in advance. It has a wonderfully sticky consistency when it is served, but that is balanced with the nuts on top of the pie and the just-crisp crust below it.

I used a shortbread crumb crust for this tart, but graham crackers would work just as well and you can also choose to use a different tart crust entirely if you want to use something other than a crumb crust. Browned Butter Tart Dough would be a great choice.

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Since I’m one of the featured bloggers for the 1,2,3 Puff Pastry contest this month, I’ve been doing quite a bit of thinking about puff pastry and its applications. Fortunately, it’s pretty versatile. Vol-au-vents are cases made of puff pastry. They look like cylinders of pastry, with high, crisp sides and a light, buttery base. The top of the vol-au-vent remains open and can be filled with just about anything, although they’re primarily used for savory appetizers and main dishes. When they’re used for desserts, these same pastries are more likely to be called tarts or simply shells. I’ve stuck with that theme here and opted to call these caramel and pear filled vol-au-vents Caramel Pear Puff Pastry Tarts, instead.

These treats have a great combination of textures and flavors. A crispy, buttery shell is made very easily with puff pastry and the sweet, fruity filling is rich and satisfying. Eating one is a lot like having your own personal pie - only without the fuss of making a regular pie crust and waiting for the filling to bake. The filling is made on the stovetop, just a quick caramel sauce with lots of pears in it. I thickened the sauce with a little bit of cornstarch, since pears will release a lot of juice as they cook and you get a nice, thick consistency by helping it to thicken just a little bit. I used brown sugar and a hint of vanilla to accent the pears.

The cases are also easy to make. Start with a sheet of puff pastry on a lightly floured surface. Cut out about a dozen 2 or 2 1/2 inch rounds with a circular cookie cutter. Cut a smaller circle out of the centers of half of those pieces. Stack the donut-shaped round on top of a solid piece, using a bit of water or lightly beaten egg to hold them together, and bake until golden. If you don’t want to make them yourself, it is possible to find this type of pastry shell ready-made in grocery stores, too. Both options are pretty quick to work with.

If all else fails, or if you simply have leftover filling, the pear-caramel mixture is great on top of vanilla ice cream, too.

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When summer comes around, I start looking for quick and easy desserts to make. One of my favorite things to put together is a fruit galette. It’s a rustic looking tart made with a pie crust or piece of puff pastry that is rolled out onto a baking sheet, topped with fresh fruit, and baked. The sides of the pie crust are folded up slightly around the fruit, giving the tart its signature rustic appearance (rustic as opposed to the fluted crusts found with tarts baked in a regular tart pan). My favorite thing about this type of tart is that you can use just about any kind of fruit in it - berries, apples, plums, nectarines, pears, grapes, etc. I just use whatever is ripe and/or in season. It is so versatile, that there is no need to rely on frozen fruit as an alternative to fresh. This one happens to be made with fresh peaches (white and yellow-skinned).

I rarely need to use an actual “recipe” for a tart like this one, since there are really only two main ingredients: fruit and a pie crust/puff pastry sheet. Once the tart has been assembled, all you really need to do is put it in the oven and bake until it is golden brown. You can use a homemade pie crust, a storebought pie crust or a sheet of puff pastry. Puff pastry is definitely the most convenient and it keeps for a very long time in the freezer, so I fall back on it a lot for a quick dessert like this one.

The only real caveat is that this type of dessert is definitely best served shortly after it is made. It is delicious when served warm with some vanilla ice cream, and is still good at room temperature up to a few hours later. Beyond that point, the tart will still taste good, but it will lose some of its crispness. Fortunately, there is little prep work to be done to make this galette, so you don’t really need to worry about needing time to make it in advance. That said, you can certainly chop up your fruit and store it in a bowl, in the fridge, until you’re ready to bake.

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Most tart doughs don’t have a very distinct flavor of their own, and if they are flavored, it’s usually something to complement the flavor of the tart filling, as is the case when you add lemon zest to the dough for a lemon tart. Otherwise, the tart crust adds texture but its flavor stays very much in the background. The Browned Butter Tart Dough makes a crust that has a great flavor on its own, a flavor that you don’t want to cover up with a too-rich filling. I think it works best for fillings with relatively subtle flavors, like citrus and vanilla.

I made this lime meringue tart specifically to go with the browned butter base. The zesty lime is bright and not too sweet, and its tartness is cut nicely by the rich flavor of the crust. The meringue topping adds a lightness and sweetness that brings everything together. This filling could, of course, be used with any type of tart crust and will work for any 9-inch tart.

The crust should be prebaked and cooled before making the filling. The lime curd is an easy, lower-fat variation on a traditional lemon curd that is made with lots of fresh lime juice. Fresh limes will definitely give you the best flavor here. I used a cooked meringue - egg whites beaten with hot sugar that “cooks” the whites as they whip - because it is more stable than uncooked meringues, and doesn’t need to go under the broiler to set up. I used my kitchen torch to give some color to the top, but that step is completely optional. You should make the lime curd right before making the make the meringue, because the two will seal together better if they both go onto the tart warm. You could also used lightly sweetened whipped cream as a topping for this tart in place of the meringue.

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Tarte tatin is one of the simplest, yet most elegant, tarts that you can make. It has just four elements - or, at least, it has just four the way that I make it: sugar, butter, apples and puff pastry. It is rich, buttery and surprisingly easy to make for a dessert that is most often seen on restaurant menus.

The tart consists of a layer of caramelized apples sitting on a puff pastry crust. Any kind of pie apple will work well for this tart, and not only does it use up fewer apples than a pie, but it takes a fraction of the time. It is made in a frying pan (usually a cast iron, although any oven-safe pan will work) and the apples are cooked in caramel before a puff pastry sheet is pressed down on top of them. The tart is baked, crust-side up, in the oven until the puff pastry is browned and crispy, then it is turned out of the pan to serve with the apple side up - usually with a side of ice cream or lightly sweetened whipped cream.

I think that the trick to getting a really good result from this tart is to make the caramel quite dark. Caramel is a great complement to sweet-tart apples and the deeper in color your caramel mixture is, the more flavor it will have. I cook the sugar alone in the skillet until it is a deep amber color - not burnt, of course - before adding in the butter. Don’t try to stir the sugar while it is melting, but feel free to slide the pan around on the burner to get every area exposed to high heat as it begins to melt. I also find it easier to choose slightly smaller apples for this because they fit into the pan better, while bigger apples sometimes must be cut down into chunks, small and medium sized apples can be used after simply being halved - making for easier prep and a more rustic (and prettier) finished tart.

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Egg custard tarts are desserts that are popular in a number of different cultures and, while all are similar, none are quite alike. Pastal de nata, the Portuguese custard tarts, are usually cooked so that the top of the tart browns and begins to caramelize. Dan tats, Chinese egg custard tarts, have a unique flakey pastry crust and a richly eggy center. The first tarts are relatively common, while the dan tats are found at some Chinese bakeries and dim sum places.

I like all incarnations of egg custard tarts (especially some a friend once delivered to me from an unnamed bakery in San Francisco’s Chinatown). The basic tart is very simply and just needs a pastry crust and a good custard filling. The tarts should be small - no bigger than two or three inches across - and stable enough that you can pick them up and eat them out of hand. This gives them great snackability, and makes them a low maintenance treat that is easy to share over coffee.

I chose not to use a traditional pie crust dough for these my, largely because I planned to make my tarts in muffin pans and felt it would be easier to hand-shape the crusts. So, I made a slightly crumbly tart dough that could simply be pressed into my baking pans. Pressing the dough by hand gave me a lot of control over the shape and thickness of the tarts. I filled up 10 muffin cups (you could do 12 slightly smaller, if you prefer) about 2/3 - 3/4 full. You can use small tart pans, if you have them, but a muffin tin really works great for these tarts. The dough is very easy to handle and very pliable when it warms slightly under your fingers.

My custard was made with milk and egg yolks, as well as a bit of sugar. The yolks gave the tarts a wonderful yellow color and ensured that the custard was very, very tender and incredibly silky. The filling contrasted beautifully with the slightly crisp crust. The flavor of the custard was classic, just hints of milk and egg, but this is a filling that could easily be flavored with vanilla, citrus or a little spice for a little variety. (more…)