Blackberry tart from Rebecca's bakery in Aspen CO

I saw these blackberries at Meijers two days ago and it made the decision between the blackberry tart and a new lemon bar recipe that I wanted to try for my cooking class. These berries were sweet and a little bit tart. They just screamed spring. You can use frozen black berries for the recipe but the fresh ones made all the difference. The first time, I tried rolling out the dough after chilling the dough for 30 minutes. It was still to sticky to roll out. I ended up pressing the dough in a tart pan. I also had to bake at 300 degrees F for 30 mins and then 200 degrees F for another 15 minutes until filling firmed up.

Here is the modified Blackberry tart from Rebecca?s bakery in Aspen Colorado in the October 1988 Bon Appetit recipe.

Pastry
1 ½ cup pastry flour
½ cup sugar
10 Tbs chilled unsalted butter cut into pieces
1 extra large egg yolk
1 Tbs whipping cream


Filling
1 ½ stick of unsalted butter
3 extra large eggs
1 egg white ( modification)
1 cup sugar
5 Tbs all purpose flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

6 Tbs red currant jelly
3 cups of fresh blackberries or frozen blackberries, thawed and drained
whipping cream

For pastry: Combine flour and sugar in food processor. Add butter and cut in using on/off turns until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add yolk and cream and blend until dough just begins to come together. Gather dough into a ball: flatten to disc. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate at least 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Roll dough out on lightly floured surface to thickness of 1/8 inch. Fit dough into 9-inch diameter tart pan with removable bottom. Trim edges. Refrigerate shell while preparing filling. Instead of rolling out the dough, I just pressed in into a tart pan.

For filling: Cook butter in a heavy small saucepan over medium heat until melted and golden brown. Once the butter started to smell nutty, turn off the heat. I burn the first browned butter by waiting until the butter turned brown before I turned off the heat.Blend eggs and sugar in large bowl. Add flour and vanilla and whisk just until combined. Whisk in butter. Set tart shell on heavy baking sheet. Pour filling into tart shell. Bake until pastry and filling are golden brown, 30 to 35 minutes. I reduced the oven to 200 for another 10 minutes until the middle of the tart was firm. Transfer tart to rack and cool completely. (Can prepare ahead 1 day ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and store at room temperature.)

Melt jelly in a heavy small saucepan over low heat or microwave the jelly for 20 secs . Spoon 2 Tablespoons jelly over filling.Set berries on top of the tart. Covering filling completely. Brush remaining jelly over berries. Let stand until jelly sets. Serve with whipping cream.