I am really big on taste and most of the times when I try a new recipe it is because I have tasted something similar which I loved or the recipe and the end result seems enticing enough. There are hardly any recipes where the inspiration is the visual appeal of the final product but this recipe started out as just that. I had seen TV show upon TV show of recipes which used fresh raspberries and they all looked stunning. Inspired to create something beautiful, I set out to make a tart with fresh raspberries adorning the top in their stunning red colour.

What I was not prepared for was that this dessert would blow me away, in terms of taste and texture and by all means I intend to make it again and again, not just as a visual delight but for the sheer joy of enjoying something like this. I made a white chocolate pastry filling for the tart and I am in love with my newfound shortcut which I also used to make the fruit charolette . I prepared instant white chocolate pudding from the mix using half the milk that was called in the recipe and I added whipped cream to it. The best part of the filling was adding seeds from a fresh vanilla bean to it. It had a wonderful aroma and the texture of the seeds in the filling was simply amazing. Using a fresh vanilla bean is a wonderful experience in itself and it makes all the difference to the dish.

The recipe for the crust was adapted from the book Williams Sonoma Cooking at Home by Chuck Williams and Kristine Kidd. I have been referring to this book off and on for many tips and interesting ideas and I like it quite a bit. I did end up baking the crust a lot longer than what was recommended in the original recipe. But even with the longer baking time, it turned out golden and beautifully cooked through.

Making a crust for a tart also involves a fair bit of technique and there are some tips that I will share here. One of the most important ones is regarding the temperature of the ingredients. The butter should be cold and pulsed well in the food processor to make the flour look crumbly. The water used to bring the dough together should also be cold. The other important step to getting the crust right is blind baking the crust. Blind baking involves placing some heavy objects on the crust before it is baked like beans, pie weights or even nuts & bolts. These are placed in an aluminium foil and baked for the initial baking of the crust. Blind baking helps to prevent the pastry from shrinking as it bakes.

Ingredients:

Tart Pastry

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces

2 tablespoons cold water or as needed

Filling

1 package white chocolate mix

1 cup cold milk

4 oz white chocolate (melted)

3/4 cup cold heavy cream

1 vanilla bean

Topping

2 pints fresh raspberries

Method:

1. In a food processor combine the flour sugar, salt and pulse a few times to mix. Scatter the butter over the top and pulse a few times until the mixture forms small irregular flakes and bits of butter the size of peas. Add 1 tablespoon water and pulse once or twice. Add the remaining 1 tablespoon water and pulse 3 or 4 times.

2. Stop and feel the dough; it should be damp enough to form a rough mass. If necessary, add a few more drops of water to achieve the correct consistency, pulsing once or twice after each addition. Remove the dough from the food processor.

3. With lightly floured hands, gently shape the dough into a smooth disk. The dough can be rolled and used rightaway or wrapped in plastic and refrigerated for at least one hour or upto overnight. I used the dough immediately and it was fairly soft so I simply pressed it into a tart pan with my hands. Make holes in the dough with a fork to prevent the uneven rising of the dough in the pan.

3. Preheat oven to 375F. Place a piece of aluminum foil in the pastry lined tart pan and place beans in it. Blind bake the shell with the beans in it for about 20 minutes. Then remove the weights and foil and bake for another 10-15 minutes till the crust becomes deep golden. Remove the crust from the oven and place on a wire rack and allow to cool.

4. To prepare the filling, prepare the pudding with 1 cup cold milk as per instructions on the box. Slit a vanilla bean into half and remove the seeds with the help of a knife. Add the seeds to the mixture above and mix well.

5. Add melted cooled white chocolate to this mixture and set aside.

6. Beat whipping cream to soft peaks and fold it into the pudding filling above till well combined.

7. Put this filling into the baked cooled tart shell and spread evenly with a spatula.

8. Top the tart with raspberries arranging them in circles moving from the outermost to the innermost circle.

9. Allow to cool in the refrigerator for atleast one hour before serving.