FAY'S LEMON & RASPBERRY TART

I love a pudding, in fact nowadays it is my favourite part of a meal and at a restaurant, I have been known to choose my pudding before my starter and main. When we had our friends round for supper on Friday I was tempted to go to Cook and buy the Chocolate Salted Caramel Vacherin but it was a bit extravagant as it served 10-12 and there was only 4 of us.....and I didn't want to spend the rest of the week pigging the leftovers myself as I have to get in a bikini in a week!

Instead I decided to cook Fay Ripley's lemon and raspberry tart as I also adore a lemony pudding. This feeds 6-8 people and it took just over an hour to cook and prepare.

Ingredients for 6-8 people:

1 x 375g pack of sweet pastry (this needs to be taken out the fridge about 45 minutes before using)
3 medium free-range eggs
75g caster sugar
220ml double cream
Juice and zest of 3 unwaxed lemons
200g fresh raspberries
Icing sugar, for dusting (I forgot this part)!

Equipment:
24cm loose bottomed flan tin
Baking beans

Preheat the oven to 200C / 180C fan / gas mark 6.

If your flan tin isn't loose bottomed (sounds quite rude!), I would recommend that you line it with baking paper - I didn't which meant the tart was tricky to cut at the end. My tin was also 28cm and so a little big for the pastry.

Roll out the pastry into the flan tin, cover with baking paper and fill with baking beans or rice and blind bake for 15 minutes. Remove the paper and beans and then pop back in the oven for 5 minutes to dry out.

Reduce the oven temperature to 180C / 160C fan / gas mark 4.

Meanwhile whisk the eggs, sugar, cream, lemon zest and juice together.

Scatter raspberries evenly over the base. Pour the filling over the berries and bake for 30 minutes. Cool and then dust with icing sugar just before serving.

I also served the tart with a dollop of vanilla ice cream. 

I have always been a fan of Fay Ripley's cookbooks, in fact her first book inspired me to learn to cook and this recipe did not disappoint. I had made this the day before and I was a little worried as to whether it would still taste as fresh. Thankfully it did. We all loved the combination of the lemon and raspberries and it was light and delectable. A couple of days later, I am just finishing off the last slice....so much for the bikini diet!!