Fancy custard pies/tartlets, Signature

David Atherton’s Fancy Custard Pies/Tartlets

The handshake card

• Baker: David Atherton
• UK series: Series 10 (2019)
• Week/theme: Week 5, Roaring Twenties
• Challenge: Signature
• Handshake fact: David received a Hollywood handshake for his fancy custard pies/tartlets.
• Yield: 6 tartlets
• Difficulty: Needs skill
• Official timing: 1 hour 45 minutes hands-on; 50 minutes baking
• Source: David’s Fancy Custards, The Great British Bake Off
• Evidence: Master index entry #32; research sources [S1], [S2], [S3].

Why it earned the handshake

David’s official Fancy Custards are generous tartlets with a softly set custard, seasonal fruit glaze, and a tiny illustrated biscuit perched on top. Their 1920s pâtisserie mood comes from the combination of clean pastry cases, jewel-like fruit, and the careful painted faces on the biscuit decorations.

Ingredients

Pastry

• 325g plain flour
• Pinch of salt
• 100g icing sugar, sifted
• 180g cold unsalted butter, diced
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tsp cornflour, plus ½ tsp water for sealing

Custard

• 600ml whipping cream
• 5 egg yolks
• 35g caster sugar
• 15g light brown soft sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla paste

Royal icing

• 1 tbsp egg white
• 200g icing sugar, sifted
• Nude, dark-brown, red, and black food-colouring gels

Fruit

Small selections of fruit, for example:

• Purple: fig, blueberries, red grapes, plum, or blackberries
• Red: strawberries, raspberries, pomegranate seeds, redcurrants, or watermelon
• Orange: orange, papaya, apricot, nectarine, banana, Sharon fruit, cantaloupe, or physalis
• Green: kiwi, honeydew melon, white nectarine, green grapes, or pear

Glaze

• ½ tbsp cornflour
• 100ml apple juice
• 25g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp liquid glucose

You will also need six 12.5cm-diameter, 4cm-deep tart or cake rings, baking paper, baking beans, a lady’s head-and-shoulders template, lined baking trays, two fine writing-nozzle piping bags, and a fine cake-decorating brush.

Method

1. Beat the flour, salt, icing sugar, and butter until fine crumbs form. Add the yolk and 1–2 tbsp water, mix briefly, bring the dough together by hand, wrap, and chill for 30 minutes.
2. Heat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/350°F/Gas 4. Roll the pastry to 4mm thick. Cut six bases and six strips about 4cm wide. Put the bases into the rings on a baking tray and reserve the trimmings.
3. Mix the cornflour with ½ tsp water and brush it around each base edge. Fit a pastry strip around each ring, press the seam together, and trim.
4. Scrunch and reopen the baking-paper squares, press one into each shell, and fill with baking beans. Re-roll the trimmings and cut six lady-shaped biscuits using the template.
5. Bake the biscuits for 10 minutes until lightly golden. Blind bake the tart shells for 14 minutes, remove the beans, and bake another 10 minutes. Cool in the rings and lower the oven to 150°C/130°C fan/300°F/Gas 2.
6. Heat the cream just to a boil. Beat the yolks, sugars, and vanilla, then gradually stir in the cream. Pour the custard into the shells and bake 20–25 minutes, until just set with a slight wobble.
7. Whisk the egg white and gradually beat in the icing sugar for 5 minutes. Divide the icing into three portions. Tint one nude and reserve half; tint one dark brown and leave the last white.
8. Pipe nude outlines for the ladies’ faces and bodies, then thin the brown icing slightly with water and fill the hair. Paint the lips red. Dry the biscuits in the oven for 5 minutes, then thin the reserved nude icing and fill the remaining areas. Pipe white hair bands, dry again, and paint the facial details with black colouring.
9. For the glaze, mix the cornflour with half the apple juice. Heat the remaining juice and sugar until dissolved, add the cornflour mixture, then add the glucose and simmer for 3 minutes. Chill.
10. Slice the fruit and arrange selections on the cooled tarts. Spoon over a little glaze and top each one with a decorated lady biscuit just before serving.

Baker’s tips

• Keep the pastry cold and the rings clean so the tartlet walls bake straight.
• The custard should still wobble slightly in the centre when it leaves the oven; it will finish setting as it cools.
• Add glaze sparingly so the fruit shines without making the custard wet.

Make-ahead

The pastry, biscuits, and glaze can be prepared ahead. Fill and decorate the tartlets close to serving, especially once the fruit has been glazed.