Queen of Hearts Jam Tarts

Ingredients:

For the Rich Shortcrust Pastry:
225g plain flour
120g butter, chilled and finely diced
1 egg yolk
1 tbsp (about) ice cold water

For the Filling:
Your choice of:
    raspberry jam
    strawberry jam
    cherry jam
    plum jam
    apricot jam
    lemon curd
    blackberry jam
    blackcurrant jam

caster sugar, for dusting

Method:

Sift the flour into a mixing bowl, add the butter and rub in with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine crumbs.

Work in the egg yolk then add just enough water to bring the ingredients together as a ball. Cover the dough in clingfilm (plastic wrap) and set aside to chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.

Turn out onto a floured work surface then dust the top of your dough and your rolling pin before rolling the dough out about 5mm thick.

Use a pastry cutter (either plain or fluted) to cut out about 14 rounds from the pastry. Use these to line the wells of a greased patty (jam tart) pan.

Roll out the remaining pastry again and use a heart-shaped cutter to cut out 14 hearts from the dough (if there is sufficient left-over pastry you can cut out more rounds and hearts to make more jam tarts).

Transfer to an oven pre-heated to 200°C (400°F, Gas Mark 6) and bake for about 6 minutes, or until the pastry is just cooked and very pale golden in colour.

Now carefully remove from the oven and fill the pastry shells with your choice of jam (you can mix and match as you like). Arrange the heart shaped pieces of pastry on top. Now return to the oven and bake for about 6 minutes more, or until the heart-shaped pastry topping is lightly coloured.

Remove from the oven a final time and set aside to cool for a few minutes before carefully removing the jam tarts from their wells with a palette knife (or any round-bladed knife). Arrange on a serving plate, sprinkle with caster sugar and serve slightly warm.

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