Lemony, light and airy, and just the perfect little hint of cheese: our Goat Cheese Tart is a splendid dessert for a special occasion. Think of this recipe as a Cheesecake meets a Tart: the lusciousness of a creamy filling, in a deliciously crisp pastry case. It’s heavenly!
The perfect sweet-crust pastry for your Goat Cheese Tart
Of course, any delicious tart needs to begin with the perfect tart shell with a pre-baked flakey pastry crust. It’s like a thin, crisp, and lemony cookie encasing the tart filling. There are a number of steps involved, but it is worth it. Here is our tutorial on the Perfect Sweet Crust Pastry.
Our tutorial includes:
How to make an easy sweet crust pastry dough
Tips on rolling out the pastry
Steps to blind bake (and what that even means, anyway!)
Add the filling to your blind-baked tart shell
The next step is so easy: just add the filling to the pre-baked pastry case, and bake again.
Dress up your Goat Cheese Tart with a Berry Coulis
A little hint of berry is a wonderful accompaniment to the Goat Cheese Tart. I mean, it is building the liley, but we could not resist.
We always keep a little frozen fruit in our freezer, so whipping up a delicious coulis sauce is simply a matter of heating up the frozen fruit with a bit of sugar, blending, and straining.
Ingredients
Makes one 11-inch tart
1 Perfect Sweet Crust Pastry Tart Shell: see recipe here
Tart Filling
8 ounces fresh goat's cheese
8 ounces cream cheese
¾ cup sugar
zest of a lemon or orange
½ teaspoon vanilla bean paste
2 eggs, separated
2 tablespoons cream
¼ cup flaked almondsBerry Coulis
2 pints fresh or 1 pound frozen raspberries
2 tablespoons sugar
2 cups water
Instructions
Make the tart filling:
Preheat the oven to 350°F.Beat the cheeses with the sugar, zest, and vanilla until absolutely smooth. Work the egg yolks in one by one, then stir in the cream. Whisk the egg whites until stiff and fold into the cream cheese mixture.
Pour the mixture into the tart shell and sprinkle with the almonds. Place in the oven and immediately turn down the temperature to 325°F. Bake until it's just set, about 20 minutes. Don’t worry if the tart seems a little wobbly — it will continue to set as it cools.
Make the coulis:
Cook the water, berries, and sugar until the mixture thickens. Look for small bubbles appearing uniformly on the surface. Test the viscosity using the back of a spoon: dip a spoon in the mixture, and then allow the spoon to cool slightly as you check it.Strain the coulis through a fine sieve to remove the seeds. Allow it to cool and serve alongside the tart.
