Tarts Anon’s name doesn’t hide much: this cult Melbourne bakery is all about the tarts. Ex-Dinner by Heston head pastry chef Gareth Whitton and his wife and business partner Catherine Way launched during lockdown, and have since grown a loyal following that visits their Collingwood and Cremorne stores for an abundant array of tarts: on the sweet side there’s tiramisu tart and key lime tart, mulled wine and ginger tart, and savouries might include potato and kimchi tart, cauliflower and shiitake tart, and corn, jalapeno and parmesan tart.
Similarly, Whitton and Way’s new cookbook, Tarts Anon, is a cornucopia of more than 50 tart recipes, including this spectacular carrot cake tart.
Tarts Anon’s carrot cake tart
Makes 1 tart
Preparation time: 1.5 hours, plus extra time to cool the cake and pastry shell, 20 minutes setting, 30 minutes resting, 1 hour refrigeration and 15 minutes freezing
Cooking time: 1 hour 20 minutes
Ingredients
Shortcrust pastry shell
200g plain flour
100g cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
3g salt
50g water
Brown butter (this recipe yields more than needed; you’ll require 100g brown butter)
500g unsalted butter
Cream-cheese glaze
60g caster sugar
1g salt
3g pectin X58
130g cream cheese
1g orange zest
100g milk
Carrot cake batter
130g grated carrot (from approx. 2 carrots)
20g natural almond meal
95g walnut meal
70g plain flour
4g baking powder
5g salt
220g soft brown sugar
100g egg
Method
To make the shortcrust pastry shell, place the flour, butter and salt into a bowl (this process can also be done in a kitchen stand mixer or food processor). Using your fingers, work the ingredients together until they resemble fine breadcrumbs and no lumps of butter are present.
Add the water a little at a time (or in a steady stream if using a kitchen stand mixer), until it forms a firm but malleable mixture. If you used a food processor earlier, it’d be best to finish this one off by hand.
Move the dough to your benchtop and work into a puck-sized shape. Wrap with plastic wrap and allow to rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
Preheat your oven to 180°C . Place the pastry on a piece of baking paper and cover with a second piece of baking paper. Using a rolling pin, roll out the pastry into a circle roughly 35cm wide, and around 3mm thick. Allow the pastry to firm up again in the fridge for at least an hour before lining the tin (if lining the tin immediately, be sure to rest it for at least an hour).
Remove one piece of baking paper from the pastry and drape the pastry over your tart tin. You may find this easier to do by using a rolling pin.
Press the pastry into the knuckles of the tart tin using the flats of your fingers.
Use a sharp knife to remove any excess trim from the edges of the pastry. Allow the pastry to sit for 15 minutes or so in the freezer for one final rest.
Take one large sheet of aluminium foil and gently press into the edges of the pastry shell, ensuring that the sheet is big enough to go over the edge and completely line the tart. Fill it to the brim with uncooked rice, then fold the foil gently back over the top and place into the oven.
Bake for 25–30 minutes, or until the edges of the pastry are a nice medium-golden colour. Remove from the oven and sneak a look under the foil to check the doneness. Cook until the colour is consistent, then allow to cool at room temperature. Remove the foil and rice when cool enough to touch.
Meanwhile, for the brown butter, place the butter into a medium saucepan over medium heat. Once completely melted, allow the butter to simmer gently until it begins to foam. Continue to cook, stirring with a whisk on occasion to prevent burning on the bottom of the saucepan. Once the butter starts to expand, small flecks of browned milk solids appear and the fizzing sound of the butter stops, remove it from the heat and allow to cool slightly.
Strain through a fine sieve to remove the milk solids (this is optional, the milk solids won’t change the flavour or texture of the tart). Store this in a container in the fridge until needed.
Preheat the oven to 165°C.
For the cream-cheese glaze, first mix the sugar, salt and pectin in a small bowl and set aside. Put the cream cheese into a plastic measuring jug and soften briefly in the microwave. Add the orange zest and milk to a saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Add the sugar and pectin mix to the simmering milk and whisk to combine, then remove from heat. Strain the milk mixture through a fine sieve into the jug with the cream cheese, then blend until smooth with a hand-held blender. Pour into a container, cover with a piece of plastic wrap placed directly onto the surface of the frosting and leave to cool in the fridge.
To make the carrot cake batter, mix the grated carrot with all the dry ingredients, except the sugar, in a bowl and set aside. Add the eggs and sugar to a separate mixing bowl. Either with a whisk or a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, slowly combine until the sugar has dissolved. You do not want to incorporate any air at this stage, as it tends to separate when the butter is added and forms a foamy crust, so keep the speed low. Melt the brown butter in a saucepan. You want this to be warm enough so that the liquid doesn’t cool down too quickly, but cool enough so that it doesn’t develop any burnt characteristics. If the butter is too hot, it can also fry the egg mixture as you add it, so a thermometer is useful (we aim for roughly 100°C).
Once the butter comes up to temperature, slowly pour it into the egg and sugar mixture (or add little by little, if whisking by hand). Ensure that the mixture is well emulsified, as this will prevent the butter from bleeding out later, giving the cake a greasy texture. Then mix in the dry ingredients, making sure that there are no lumps suspended throughout the batter.
To bake, pour the batter into your cooled pastry shell and place in the oven to bake for approximately 30 minutes, or until the centre of the tart springs back when pressed. Remove from the oven and allow to cool inside the tin.
Once the cake layer has completely cooled it’s ready to be glazed. Warm two-thirds of the glaze in a small saucepan over low heat until just melted. Pour this onto the remaining third and blend with a hand-held blender until smooth. Pour the glaze onto the centre of the cake and use a swirling motion to move the glaze to the edges of the tart. Then, tap gently on the bench so that the glaze fills the knuckles of the crust.
Once the glaze has filled the gaps, allow to set for 20 minutes before removing the tart from the tin and portioning into slices with a hot, sharp knife.
This is an edited extract from Tarts Anon by Gareth Whitton and Catherine Way (Hardie Grant Books, RRP $45). Available nationally now.
