Crostata alle Fragole
A baked sweet pastry case filled with vanilla pastry cream and topped with fresh strawberries and a glaze, in 1 hour 20 minutes.
Photograph credit: Strawberry Tarts by Beck · CC BY 2.0 · Flickr
How to Cook Crostata alle Fragole
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Rub the butter into the flour, sugar and salt, add the egg and press into a dough. Chill for 20 minutes.
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Heat the oven to 180°C / 355°F. Line a 24 cm tin with the pastry and bake blind with baking beans for 20 minutes. Remove the beans and bake for 10 minutes more. Cool.
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Warm the milk. Whisk the yolks, 80 g sugar and cornflour, pour on the milk, whisking, and return to the pan. Stir for 5 minutes until thick. Add the vanilla and cool with cling film on the surface.
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Spread the cream in the shell and arrange the strawberries on top.
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Warm the jam, sieve it and brush it over the fruit. Chill until serving.
Keep an Eye on These
- Cool the shell fully before filling.
- Press cling film on the cream while it cools.
- Assemble within 3 hours of serving.
A Little Background
Bake the case alone, with nothing in it, and fill it cold. That is the principle behind a fresh fruit tart: crisp pastry, cool cream and fruit that has never seen the oven. Crostata alle fragole is the Italian version, made with a pasta frolla shell and pastry cream.
Blind bake the shell with baking beans for 20 minutes, then without them for 10, so the base is dry and gold all the way across. Cool it completely before filling, or the cream will melt into the pastry and turn it soft. The cream is a quick custard of milk, yolks, sugar and cornflour, stirred until thick and cooled with cling film pressed on it.
Spread the cream in the shell and arrange the strawberries, hulled and halved, in tight circles from the outside in. Brush with warm, sieved apricot jam for a glossy glaze. Chill until serving, but not for more than 3 hours, as the shell softens. Cut with a serrated knife.
To Go With It
Coffee · Prosecco · Whipped cream
Storing Leftovers
Best the day it is assembled. Keeps 1 day in the fridge.
Common Questions
How long does Crostata alle Fragole take to make?
30 minutes of preparation and 30 minutes of cooking, plus 20 minutes of chilling, so allow 1 hour 20 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 8.
Crostata alle Fragole Nutrition Facts
Per serving, calculated from the ingredient list with USDA FoodData Central figures (SR Legacy). A calculation, not a laboratory analysis: brands, cuts and how you measure change the real numbers. How the figures are worked out.
Your notes on this recipe
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Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked.
First published ; last changed .
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