Bord Bia Irish Food Bloggers Event Part Trois

I am entering this tart into English Mum's Big Bake Off due to some bullying, yes blatant bulling from The Glutton and of bit of Gluttony egging on from English Mum herself.  Wish me luck peeps.

I may have mentioned once or thrice that I recently attended a Food Bloggers Event in Bord Bia.  Well, for those of you who missed that I did.  As part of the days events the lovely people at Bord Bia fed and watered us very nicely indeedy.  Much to everyone's delight, having stuffed us full of delicious Irish Pork and various accompaniments, dessert followed in the form of a beautiful strawberry tart.  The room filled with 'oohs' and 'aahs' of appreciation as it was delivered to tables and I heard more than one person express an interest in receiving the recipe after lunch.  Now, as if the people of Bord Bia had not been good enough to us already they happily said they would make the recipe available to anyone interested, and they did.  Having put them to the trouble of emailing me with said recipe it would have been positively rude of me not to post about it, so here you go peeps, get ready to drool.  This is a deliciously light tart, perfect for summer entertaining.  I made it last night and it is no more this morning.  Mr. Boo and myself had a very generous slice each and my neighbours were the lucky and very grateful recipients of the rest. So go on, off to the kitchen with you and whip up this little lovely.  Go on, shoo!

White Chocolate and Strawberry Tart

Serves 12

250g Plain Flour
25g Icing Sugar
65g Cold Unsalted Butter
1 Egg
250g Mascarpone
200g bar of good quality white chocolate
145ml cream
400g Strawberries

1) Sieve the flour and icing sugar into a food processor. Add the butter and whiz until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add just enough egg to bring the mixture together.
2) Shape pastry into a disc and wrap in cling film and chill for 30 minutes.
3) Roll out the pastry and shape into a 20.5cm (8”) fluted pastry tin. Prick all over. Cover with a large circle of baking parchment and top with baking beans. Chill until firm. Preheat the oven to 190°C(170°C fan)/374°F/Mark 5.

4) Bake for 12-15 minutes until the pastry has set. Remove the beans and parchment and continue baking for 5-10 minutes until the pastry is dry and slightly sandy to the touch. Cool in the tin on a wire rack.
5) Melt the mascarpone and chocolate together in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of gently simmering water, making sure the base the of bowl doesn’t touch the water. Don’t stir; otherwise the mixture will thicken into a sticky mess.
6) Remove bowl from the pan and set aside to cool completely. Meanwhile, lightly whip the cream. Fold the chocolate mixture into the cream. Spoon the filling into the pastry case and chill.
7) To serve, top with strawberries cut in half and dust with icing sugar.

I have added some notes after the pics.

Notes: 

I forgot to dust it with icing sugar at the end as I was a tad over excited at the prospect of getting stuck into it!

I added the egg a couple of tablesppons at a time (I broke it into a small bowl and gave it a little whisk) until I had enough, rather than add it all at once and find I had too much.

I used my grease proof paper trick to line the pastry case but cut it a little big so that I could gather up the edges to remove the baking beans easily.

If you have neither the time nor the energy to bake your own pastry buy a ready made tart case from a supermarket and just make the filling. (I'm all for the easy life so don't worry I won't judge you, promise)

I know it says DO NOT STIR up there, but I just couldn't resist.  When I removed the chocolate mixture from the heat I did give it a quick stir to mix the chocolate and mascarpone as I was afraid they would not mix when added to the cream once chilled.  Sorry, but that was like asking Dougal NOT to press the big red button, it just wasn't going to happen.

OK lesson over, now off with yiz!