Photography: John Paul Urizar. Styling: Michele Cranston.
Impress your guests this Christmas with Maggie Beer’s blue cheese tarts.
These tarts are a perfect bit of indulgence this festive season. They’re an elevated blue cheese tart that uses sour cream pastry and quince paste to deliver a stand-out starter for every celebration.
Ingredients
Method
Grease a 12-cup (1/3 cup/80ml) muffin pan. Unroll the pastry and cut 12 x 8cm rounds. Ease pastry rounds into each pan hole, pressing into the base and side. Refrigerate for 15 minutes, then remove and prick the bases with a fork.
Preheat oven to 240°C (220°C fan-forced). Line each of the pastry cases with baking paper. Using pastry weights (or dried beans or rice) weigh down with baking paper. Bake for 10-12 minutes, then remove the baking paper and weights and bake on lower shelf for a further 5 minutes, or until the base is cooked through. Remove from the oven.
Reduce oven temperature to 200°C (180°C fan-forced).
Divide the quince paste and blue cheese between the 12 pastry shells and then place back into the oven and cook tarts for 5 to 6 minutes, until the quince and cheese has warmed through and melted slightly.
Remove from the oven and transfer to a serving platter. Serve blue cheese tarts with sliced fresh red grapes and figs, season with freshly cracked black pepper, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and garnish with chervil.
Why do I need to blind bake the pastry for these blue cheese tarts?
In short, it will keep your pastry bases from becoming soggy. Baking blind means partially baking a pastry crust without the filling, and helps ensure your pastry will be crisp.
Read this article for more Test Kitchen advice on how to properly blind bake pastry.
