You Want Pies with That? Fashion Statement

This month’s theme for “You Want Pies with That” is Pies as a Fashion Statement. Gosh, I did find this quite a hard theme. I had a few ideas, but after my sisters bought me a huge punnet of strawberries up from the Hawkes Bay, I went with my very first idea. When I was little my Mum made me a dress from material that I chose myself. The dress was yellow gingham with little strawberries dotted all over it. It was sleeveless with red bias binding round the sleeves and two patch pockets with bias binding across the top of them. I loved that dress and I still love it – in fact I still have it! Unfortunately it is packed away, so I couldn’t photograph it for my blog.



So, my fashion statement pie resembles my favourite dress! I made lemon and passionfruit tarts with strawberries on top. The yellow of course representing the yellow gingham. I made the tart crusts from Dorie Greenspan’s recipe for sweet shortcrust pastry, but you could buy ready made. The lemon and passionfruit curd is a perfect combination of sweet and tart. I made 8 cm tarts, but you could make one big one or even mini tarts in mini muffin tins. These tarts sing of summer and they really do remind me of my favourite dress! The fabric in the background is actually similar to my yellow dress - it is my favourite apron - I bought the fabric to make it beacuse it reminded me of my favourite dress!!



My favourite Dress Tarts

· Line six 8cm tart tins with shortcrust pastry, prick the bottoms and freeze. Bake from frozen for 15 minutes at 180c
· When cool, fill the tart cases with lemon and passionfruit curd (recipe follows) then top with sliced strawberries
Lemon and Passionfruit Curd

½ c sugar
½ c passionfuit pulp
juice of 5 lemons
6 egg yolks
200g butter

combine all ingredients in a small pot and warm over a low heat, continually whisking until smooth – don’t let the mixture boil. Cool before storing in the fridge.