My cherry eating strategy has changed now. They are one of my favourite fruits but these days the stones end up in my garden; again, still waiting. My fascination with cherries hasn’t diminished either; a flavour like no other, thin skins and awkward to cook with, when they are in season I can’t get enough of them.
Ingredients
You will need (for one tart):
- 450g cherries
- Sweet shortcrust pastry (100g cold butter, 200g plain flour, 30g caster sugar, 1 egg beaten)
- Cream filling (150ml double cream, 2 egg yolks, 50g sugar)
- 1 egg, beaten
First of all make the pastry. Rub the butter into the flour until you have a breadcrumb texture. Add the sugar, lightly mix it in and then bring the pastry together with the egg. If you find the pastry is a little dry you can add drops of cold water until it comes together. Chill the pastry in the fridge for half an hour. If you find pastry intimidating, see my pastry guide for do’s and don’ts.
While the pastry is chilling, remove the stones from the cherries by running a knife around each cherry to halve it and then pop the stone out. This is made much easier if the cherries are nice and ripe. It’s a bit of a fumble but better this than to crunch down on a cherry stone when eating the tart.
Whisk together all of the ingredients for the cream filling. Put the cherries into the tart case and cover with the cream mixture. Put back into the oven for 40-45 minutes or until set and golden brown. When you remove the tart from the oven allow 15-20 minutes before you try and remove it from the tin. It’s not worth trying to remove it too early and it falling apart.
These heritage cherries are more subtle and delicate than their mainstream cousins. They flavoured the tart beautifully and were incredibly juicy. I’m not sure I’ve had a cherry with that much juice in before. It was a wonderfully quintessential dessert which would normally demand a cup of tea and plenty of time to savour the flavour. Not us though. This tart was devoured in its entirety in no more than twenty minutes.
Glad your tactic changed! This tart is gorgeous, and oh so lovely!
Wow, that is a gorgeous tart. Recipes like this are the reason I bought a cherry pitter.
Beautiful cherries and tart. Lots of patience is needed for stoning by hand. I too think we would polish the tart off very quickly.
Delicious, delicious…. I would love to have it with a cup of tea!
I think we were all told the story of a cherry tree growing in us if we were to eat the pits. Funny! I absolutely love the tart. Just made a pie, but I think I’ll need to make this tart too!
Your cherry tart looks absolutely delicious and inspirational. I might finally tackle the cherries sitting in my fridge waiting to be pitted and used in a recipe.
Looks yummy. If I manage to net my cherry trees next year, it may be a possibility.
Oh Lordy, that is a thing of beauty! So delicious. Your account of the cherries stones made me laugh and reminded me of my nephew(at the time aged 3) who had a penchant for sticking cherry stones up his nose! Luckily my sister is an ENT surgeon and fished the stones out easily enough 🙂
Caroline, your cherry pie looks totally lush. A pity cherries are so expensive here, wish there was an abundance and I would love to be able to make this.
Looks absolutely lovely!
The cherries looks gorgeous and the tart too! It looks like a real treat!
I like your cherry tart, I wish to try the recipe, because I like using your cooking method. When I was a child I ate a lot of cherries too: sweet, black, juicy Italian cherries, no stones but many painful tummy aches!
I too am waiting for a tree to gro win my belly, mine is an apple tree though 😛 This tart looks beautiful…and best of all…tasty. Think I’ll be trying something along these lines very soon!
Oh I have a big weakness for everything with cherries!
Everything with cherries is my favoruite, this tart looks incredible 😀
Cheers
CCU
I would love a slice please:)
I’ve never made a cherry tart like this, which is almost like a clafouti with crust. I’m sure I’d like it though. My innovation during cherry season (long gone here) was a cherry-chocolate focaccia, which is much better than it sounds.
Scrumptious looking pie! Yum!
ok, i seriously need a cherry pitter. this looks like a wonderful use of cherries!
yum yum yum! so pretty!
I LOVE cherry tart! This looks so tempting & would love to have a slice NOW! YUM!
I could eat the whole thing 🙂
we never have enough cherries to bake with: we love it fresh so much. Your tart looks lovely! May I have a piece? ! 🙂
oh, this is a pretty tart! i’ve never baked with fresh cherries before, they always land first in my stomach!
That look so good-I’m not surprised at all that it was demolished within minutes!!
wow that sounds great! love the double cream.
The tart looks spectacular!
This looks absolutely delicious! And a great way to use up all of the cherries I have sitting around 🙂
this looks really delicious! I love cherries but not baked much with them – will have to try this out!
I am a little confused about the cream filling ingredients. It has 2 egg yolks in it. Then outside the brackets you have an egg but never mention what you do with this. Should this also be included in the Cream Filling?
Hi Lulu. The other egg (listed last in the ingredients) is used to brush over the pastry base after blind baking. Hope that helps!