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Maids of Honour Tarts

Maids of Honour Tarts is a traditional British recipe from the 19th century for mini cheesecake-like tartlets that purportedly originate in Tudor times. The full recipe is presented here and I hope you enjoy this classic British version of: Maids of Honour Tarts.

prep time

20 minutes

cook time

30 minutes

Total Time:

50 minutes

Additional Time:

(+cooling)

Makes:

12

Rating:

Tags : Cheese RecipesBaking RecipesCake RecipesBritish Recipes

According to legend, maids of honour tarts (also known as Richmond maids of honour) s said to date back to King Henry VIII when he witnessed some of the Queen's Maids of honour eating some cakes and demanded to taste one. He found them delicious and named them after the maids. Some even claim that the maid who made the tarts was imprisoned and had to produce them solely for the King.[6] However, there is another theory that they were named after Anne Boleyn, a maid of honour at the time, who made the cakes for Henry VIII. The recipe presented here only goes back to the 1850s. However, made with curd cheese it is an example of traditional cheesecakes. Note that curd cheese is not the same as cottage cheese and to make this recipe you really must source (or make) curd cheese. The modern version is made with puff or rough putt pastry. However, I've reverted this recipe to using a rich sweet shortcrust.

Ingredients:

150g plain flour, plus extra for rolling out
85g butter, in small pieces
1 level tbsp icing sugar
1 egg yolk
115g (4 oz) curd cheese (or you can make your own curd cheese/fromage frais) or low-fat cream cheese, room temperature (or you can use my home-made cream cheese recipe to prepare your own)
50g (1/4 cup) sugar
30g (1/4 cup, firmly packed) super-fine ground almonds
Finely grated zest 1 lemon
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 large egg, at room temperature
2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
To Garnish: a faint dusting of powdered sugar

Method:

Pre-heat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/350F/Gas 4. Rub the butter into the flour, then add the icing sugar and a pinch of salt. Mix the egg yolk with 2 tsp water and add to the flour mixture to make a stiff dough. Roll the pastry out to the thickness of a pound coin and cut out 12 rounds. Use to line 12 tartlet tins.

Melt the butter and leave it to cool.

In small mixing bowl (I use a 1-quart glass measure), mix together the softened cheese, sugar, almond flour, lemon zest and lemon juice. Beat in the egg and then the melted and cooled butter until thoroughly combined. Spoon the filling into the tart shells, filling them nearly to the top. Bake for about 25 minutes, until puffed and golden.

Let cool in the tin for 5 minutes before removing to wire rack to finish cooling. They will sink a little as they cool. You may give them a very light dusting of powdered sugar (icing sugar), if you like, just before serving.