Skip to main content
Dessert

Cream Strawberry Tarts

A tart of layered strawberries and a creamy custard filling baked in puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Cream Strawberry Tarts

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

  1. Pick over the strawberries carefully.

  2. Arrange them in layers in a deep pie tin lined with puff pastry.

  3. Sprinkle sugar thickly between each layer.

  4. Fill the pie tin with strawberries and pour in some of the juice.

  5. Cover with a thick crust, making a slit in the top.

Bake and make the cream

  1. Bake at 400°F (200°C).

  2. While the pie bakes, heat a small cup of cream until it boils.

  3. Stir in the beaten egg whites, 1 tablespoon of sugar, and 1 teaspoon of cornstarch mixed with cold milk.

  4. Boil the mixture for a few moments until smooth.

  5. Set aside to cool.

Finish and serve

  1. Once the pie is baked, pour the cream mixture into the pie through the slit in the crust.

  2. Serve cold, dusted with powdered sugar.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Fresh strawberries
Provide the main fruit filling, with juice that moistens the crust and sweetness.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and draws out juice from the strawberries.
Puff pastry
Forms the flaky, buttery crust that holds the filling.
Egg whites
Thicken and set the cream mixture as it heats.
Cornstarch
Thickens the cream mixture so it becomes smooth and holds its shape.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, custard-like texture to the filling.

The step that matters

Boiling the cream mixture until smooth. Egg whites and cornstarch must be heated to thicken the cream; if the mixture is not brought to a boil and stirred, it stays thin or may be grainy and the texture fails to set.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes