Cherry Tart
INGREDIENTS for medium-sized tart. -1 lb. of cherries, 2 small tablespoonfuls of moist sugar, 1/24 lb. of short crust. AVERAGE COST, 10d.
Pick the stalks from the cherries, put them, with the sugar, into a deep pie-dish just capable of holding them, with a small cup placed upside-down in the midst of them. Make a short crust with 1/2 pound of flour, by either of the recipes for short crust; lay a border round the edge of the dish, put on the cover, and ornament the edges ; bake in a brisk oven from 1/2 hour to 40 minutes; strew finely-sifted sugar over, and serve hot or cold, although the latter is the more usual mode. It is more economical to make two or three tarts at one time, as the trimmings from one tart answer for lining the edges of the dish for another, and so much paste is not required as when they are made singly. Unless for family use, never make fruit pies in very large dishes; select them, however, as deep as possible.
TIME. hour to 40 minutes.
SEASONABLE in June, July and August.
Note. A few currants added to the cherries will be found to impart a nice piquant taste to them.
CHESTNUT SOUP.
A plain covered fruit pie of the Victorian type: no thickener, no par-cooking, and a cup in the middle to hold the lid up out of the juice.
- The inverted cupA small ovenproof teacup or an egg cup set upside-down in the centre of the dish props the pastry lid clear of the fruit and gives the juice somewhere to collect. A ceramic pie bird does the same job. Without it the crust sits on wet fruit and goes sodden.
- Quantity of pastryThe ingredient line as printed gives an impossible fraction. The method itself is explicit: short crust made with 1/2 lb (about 2 cups) of flour, which is roughly 12 oz of finished pastry.
- A brisk ovenA hot oven. The book gives no temperatures, but around 425F/220C to set and colour the pastry, dropping to about 375F/190C for the remainder, works. The stated 1/2 hour to 40 minutes suits a dish of this size.
- Moist sugarMoist sugar is unrefined soft brown sugar. Two small tablespoons for a pound of cherries is restrained by modern taste; sour or morello cherries will want three to four, sweet dark cherries need no more than the original.
- Cherries unstonedBeeton removes only the stalks, so the stones stay in and would have been dealt with at table. Stoning gives up considerably more juice, so if you pit them, expect a wetter filling and keep the pastry border well sealed.
- The border of pasteWetting the dish rim and pressing on a strip of trimmings before laying the lid is what keeps the crust attached as the filling boils. Skipping it is the usual cause of a lid that lifts and slides.
- The currants in the noteThese are fresh red or white currants, not dried vine fruit. A handful sharpens the sweetness of ripe cherries; there is no need to adjust anything else.
- YieldA medium pie dish of about 1 1/2 pints, serving four to six. The finely sifted sugar goes over the hot crust just before it cools, so it clings.
Beeton's fruit tarts are all built on the same frame -- deep dish, raw fruit, sugar, a single top crust -- and the differences between them are mostly a matter of season, which is why her entries carry a SEASONABLE line. Cherries came to English kitchens in a short summer window, and the Kentish orchards around Sittingbourne and Faversham supplied London markets through June, July and August with fruit that was eaten fresh, bottled, or baked exactly like this. What is striking is the housekeeping advice folded into the method: make two or three tarts at once so the trimmings from one line the rim of the next, and avoid very large dishes unless the family is eating alone. The economy of pastry scraps and the etiquette of dish size sit side by side, which is the book's whole character in miniature. The cost, tenpence, is given as a matter of course.