BraveTart Archives

If you were at the McCrae Avenue Farm Boy store in Ottawa last Saturday afternoon, and heard a high pitched squeal, that was me. For the past month I have been watching my instagram feed blow up with images of rhubarb creations. I wanted in on the fun, but there no rhubarb anywhere in my neck of the woods.

To be clear, this was not local rhubarb. It’s still too early for that here. It was that pretty pink “forced” rhubarb, which I love way more, because of that gorgeous hue. If you follow me on instagram you may have caught my teaser video.

Cooked rhubarb can be a bit mushy in texture, so I like to combine it with another fruit. Strawberries are the classic pairing, but I went rogue and opted for raspberries.

The rhubarb needs to be cooked before it can go into the tart. Roasting helps retain that pretty shade of pink. It needs sugar to tame the its astringency and some orange zest to enhance the flavour and aroma.
I drained the roasted rhubarb to get rid of any excess liquid, so that my tart bottom would not get soggy. Mary Berry does not like soggy bottoms. The raspberries get mixed in after the rhubarb is roasted.

I used a deep dish 8 inch tart pan, with a removable bottom, for a dramatic presentation. You could also use a springform pan. For fun, because that’s what my life has come to, I doubled the recipe and also made 6 mini tarts.As has been the case lately, this recipe took more than one attempt to get it just right. But I am happy to report that I nailed it on the second try!

In my first attempt I pre-baked the crust for 20 minutes, added the filling, topped it with a simple French meringue and baked it for a further 30 minutes. The delicate raspberries turned to mush, the bottom crust was soggy and the meringue turned brown and was really tough and chewy.

On the second attempt I pre-baked the crust for almost 35 minutes, so that it was totally golden brown and gorgeously flaky and crispy. To solve the meringue dilemma, I turned to pastry wizard “Bravetart ” (aka Stella Parks) and she pointed me in the direction of a Swiss meringue. The main difference between the two types of meringue is that in a Swiss meringue, you heat the egg whites and sugar first, before whipping them. In a French meringue, there is no pre-heating before whipping. A Swiss meringue whips up fluffier and more stable than its French cousin and it is safe to eat without additional cooking time. If you are curious and want to learn more, Stella wrote a great piece on Serious Eats about it.
I topped the pre-baked tart shells with the rhubarb-raspberry filling, topped them with the Swiss meringue, and baked them for a brief 10 minutes just to give the meringue a golden kiss. The raspberries maintained their integrity and the meringue was pillowy soft, fluffy and SOOOOO delicious, like the very best homemade marshmallows.
Perfect with a cup of tea!

Click here to print recipe for Rhubarb-Raspberry Meringue Tart.

I have a recipe for an apple caramel cake that is outstanding. But some occasions (maybe breakfast if you’re my husband) call for a simpler cake. This cake is perfect for those times. This is a dense cake. Not that there’s anything wrong with that! I mean dense in the best possible sense. This is yellow cake at it’s finest. Owing to butter, eggs, whole milk and sour cream it has a compact velvety texture.

My dad would have described this cake as plain. And he would have meant it as a great compliment. He liked subtle flavours, nothing too sweet, ornate or fancy. The inspiration for this cake comes from Sarabeth’s Good Morning Cookbook. Sarabeth knows good breakfast!

The first tweak I made to the original recipe was to toast the sugar. Stella Parks over at Serious Eats convinced me to give it a try. The bottom line is that toasting sugar in the oven tames sugar’s sweetness and the longer you toast it, the more intense the caramel flavour will be. Check out her article if food science is your jam.

I toasted my sugar for about 2 1/2 hours. The toasted sugar is on the right. I tasted both, side by side and did find that the toasted sugar tasted less sweet. You can toast 4 pounds at one time and it will keep forever, just like white sugar. Start with a 9 inch tube pan (also called an angel food cake pan). Butter and flour the pan very well.I made this cake twice last week. The first time I made it, I found it too plain. (Sorry dad!). On the second go-round I added an additional layer of apples and coated the apple slices in cinnamon-sugar.

Half the batter goes into the pan. Smooth it out.I used the first Honeycrisp apples of the fall season! Pink Lady or Granny Smith would also be great choices.Top batter with cinnamon apples.Repeat with a second layer of batter and cinnamon apples. Then drizzle with custard mixture.Resist the urge to turn the cake out of the pan until it has completely cooled. Your patience will be handsomely rewarded. The ribbon of cinnamon coated apples that runs through the center of this cake is quite beautiful.