1 small handful fresh baby mint leaves
Method
First you will need to grease a 28cm loose-bottomed tart tin with a
little butter. To make your pastry, cream together the butter, icing
sugar and salt and rub in the flour, vanilla seeds, lemon zest and egg
yolks – you can do all this by hand or in a food processor. When the
mixture looks like coarse breadcrumbs, add the cold milk or water. Pat
and gently work the mixture together until you have a ball of dough,
then flour it lightly. Don't work the pastry too much, otherwise it will
become elastic and chewy, not flaky and short as you want it to be.
Wrap the dough in cling film and place in the fridge for at least an
hour. Remove it from the fridge, roll it out and line your tart tin.
Place in the freezer for an hour. Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4
and bake the pastry case for around 12 minutes or until lightly golden.
To make the filling, split the vanilla pod in half lengthways and scrape
out the seeds by running a knife along the inside of each half. Put the
mascarpone, cream, vanilla seeds, sugar and grappa into a large bowl
and whip until shiny. Have a taste – you should have an intensely rich,
fluffy and lightly sweetened cream with a fresh hint of grappa. If you
can't get grappa, you can do it without, or add a swig of vin santo
instead.
Once the pastry has cooled, get yourself a spatula and add the sweetened
cream to the pastry case. Smear it all round so it's reasonably level,
then cover it with the berries – place them lightly on the cream, no
need to push them in. If you want to be a bit more generous than this,
feel free, and if you want to mix your berries you can do this too.
Next, in a small pan, melt down a couple of tablespoons of jam with 3 or
4 tablespoons of water. Stir until it becomes a light syrup, then,
using a clean pastry brush, lightly dip and dab the fruit with the jam.
Sprinkle with the baby mint leaves before eating. Great served either as
one large tart or as small individual ones. Lovely with your afternoon
tea. Either serve straight away or place in the fridge until you're
ready to eat it.
