Gin and lemon tart for alternative to Christmas pudding!

We love Christmas pudding but not everyone in the family feels the same, so we like to offer an alternative pudding as we all like pudding! This year I will be making gin and lemon tart, which is like tart au citron but with added gin!

Gin and lemon tart

Serves: 8

Ingredients

Pastry

150g of plan flour (sieved)

50g ground almonds

35g icing sugar (sieved)

75g of chilled unsalted butter, chopped into cubes

Zest of a lemon

1 egg yolk

Approx 3 tablespoons of cold water

TART FILLING

2 eggs

150 mls of cream

80g of caster sugar

zest of 1 lemon

juice of 2-3 lemons to 100ml

50ml of Gin

3 juniper berries, lightly bruised

To make the pastry.

Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6.

1. Sieve the flour, ground almonds and icing sugar into a bowl and add the lemon zest.

2.  Add the cubed butter and with your fingers rub in the butter until the mix is like fine breadcrumbs.

3.  Add the egg yolk and enough cold water that the mix is covered and then gather into a soft dough.

4. Put the dough into the fridge for 30 minutes.

5. Roll our the chilled pastry on a floured board until is it 3-4 mm thick.

6. Grease an 8 inch flan tin

7. Bake the pastry case blind for 10 minutes until light golden brown. Return the empty pastry case to the oven for another 10-12 minutes or until it is pale golden and completely dry. Set aside to cool while you make the filling. Reduce the oven temperature to 170C/325F/Gas 3.

The Filling

1. For the filling whisk together the eggs, caster sugar, lemon zest and juice. Add the cream, crushed juniper berries and gin and whisk until combined.
2. Leave to mix with the flavour of the juniper berries for ten minutes, then remove the berries.
3.  Pour the filling into the tart base and bake for 7 to 10 minutes or until the filling is just set. Set aside to cool.
4. Serve with cream.