Mincemeat and Almond Tart

I decided to make this tart, from Mary Berry's complete cookbook, this week as Gary. It looked like a bakewell tart but with mincemeat instead of jam and I like mincemeat!! 

The first step for the tart involved making a simple short crust pastry. Usual process of mixing butter and flour together then adding egg, sugar and water. This was placed in the fridge to cool for at least 30minutes. 

Pastry made and ready to go in the fridge

Once the pastry had cooled it was rolled and placed in a flan dish and again cooled until ready. 

To make the filling I cream together butter and sugar and then added ground almonds and almond extract. This was all whisked together. 

Almond filling whisked together

The mincemeat was then placed on the bottom of the case and the almond mixture spread on top. This was baked in the oven for around 1 hour until the middle felt solid. This did result in the top getting too brown though so next time I would cover this up. 

Cooling tart

While the tart cooled I made some icing by mixing together icing sugar, lemon juice and water and spread this over the top. I then sprinkled almonds on top. 

The tart was sliced into 10 pieces and then mine was cut in half again which resulted in my slice having 340 calories. So an unhealthy tart then!! 

My slice BEFORE halving.

The verdict: I really enjoyed this tart but mainly because it had mincemeat in it. I was disappointed with the cake mixture as when raw it tasted strongly of almonds, however, once cooked the mincemeat flavour was overwhelming and I couldn't taste it anymore. I would recommend less mincemeat and next time I would just make a standard bakewell tart. I would give it 7/10 as I found the flavour combinations disappointing. I also didn't find the recipe particularly easy to follow and felt that my tart came out too dark and my icing too runny. 

Mincemeat Buns P.465

When my mum came to visit me today she had a lovely present for me, a jar of mincemeat. I love mincemeat so when I saw this recipe I thought it sounded delicious but we couldn't find any mincemeat in the shops. So was delighted by this surprise present. 

This is a very easy recipe, I didn't have any currants so these were omitted today. It's an all in one recipe, so combined in the bowl I placed mincemeat, eggs, sugar, margarine and self raising flour. This was all combined with the whisk and then placed in the cupcake cases. 

Cupcakes in the oven

These were then placed in the oven and cooked for around 30 minutes until the cakes were golden brown and springing back to the touch. These were left to cool and then we sampled them. 

Out of the oven and cooling

Inside of the cupcake, could do with a little more fruit. 

As my mum provided the key ingredient this time I have used her opinion for today's verdict. I thought this cake was delicious, the flavour of the mincemeat was strong enough to be tasted throughout the cake, and I didn't find these cakes too sweet. My mum says that the cupcakes are very nice but a crunchy topping of maybe some demerara sugar. My mum gave the score of 9/10 and I also agree with this mark of 9/10. I felt that the cake would have been even better if I'd followed the recipe and put in some currants for a bit of extra fruit. 

This recipe was so good that I'm going to attempt to make it again with these small changes, I will keep you posted on how this goes.