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Miniature Strawberry-Cream Tarts

I'm giving two crust options for these, but you're probably best off just using the normal cream cheese-and-butter version in the previous recipes. The alternate version is a little sweeter and crumblier, and harder to work with. But if you want a little variety in your tart crusts, well, give it a try.

Sugar content would be around 1 teaspoon or so per tart. If you figured on 5 grams you'd be on the safe side.

Course Dessert
Servings 24 mini tarts,5 grams of sugar per tart
Debi Simons Debi Simons

Ingredients

Crust--used in other tart recipes:

  • 1 stick butter
  • 4 oz. cream cheese, or 1/2 of an 8-oz. pkg.
  • 1 1/4 cups flour

Crust--alternate, sweeter and more crumbly version:

  • 1 stick butter
  • 2 tablespoons powdered sugar
  • 1 cup flour

Filling:

  • 3 oz. softened cream cheese
  • 1/2 cup sugar original recipe says "superfine"
  • 1 cup heavy cream, whipped until it holds soft peaks
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice

Garnish:

  • raspberries or sliced strawberries
  • 1/2 cup currant jelly

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

For either crust version:

  1. Pulse ingredients in a food processor. The cream-cheese pastry will come together into a ball.  The powdered-sugar version will be more sandy.

For the cream-cheese pastry:

  1. Chill the dough until firm, then pinch off 1/2-oz. balls (use a kitchen scale if you have one) and press into a 24-count mini-tart pans. Have a rim stick up around the edge. Prick the bottoms a time or two. Bake for about 15 minutes, until lightly browned.

For the powdered-sugar pastry:

  1. Put a heaping tablespoon of crust into each tart cup and then use your fingers to press the mixture together into a crust. Prick the bottoms a time or two. You won't be able to get much of a rim with this, but do your best. Bake for about 10 minutes, or until lightly browned.

For the filling:

  1. After whipping the cream then whip in the cream cheese, sugar and lemon juice.

To assemble the tarts:

  1. Scoop a rounded tablespoon of the filling into each tart shell. You may be able to get more than that in. Since the filling is fairly stiff, it can be mounded up quite a bit. Then place a raspberry or strawberry slice on each and brush with the currant jelly that you've microwaved briefly (10-15 seconds). 

Recipe Notes

Since this filling contains dairy you'll have to refrigerate the tarts before serving.