Cherry Amaretto Bakewell Tart

Hi friends. Again, I'm sorry for the lengthy time in between posts, but 2017 was a BUSY year! I bought a house, and more importantly got married in December of 2017! Life has been so wonderful to me and I'm so thankful for what the past year has brought!

Currently my now husband (!!!!) Lee and I, are planning a trip to Peru for this summer. Machu Picchu is at the top of my bucket list. Pretty surreal I'm crossing that off. We are beyond excited. I'm also headed to Las Vegas at the end of this coming week for the first time! We have all sorts of adventures planned, and I wouldn't want our first year of marriage, or honestly any year of our marriage to be any different!

Now onto the important stuff. Cherry. Amaretto. Bakewell. Tart. I've had an obsession with the Great British Baking Show, or the Great British Bake Off for a hot second now. The 2016 winner, Candice Brown, is honestly everything I want to be when I grow up. She's beautiful, ridiculously talented, and generally seems like the most pleasant person.

This recipe comes from her cookbook Comfort: Delicious Bakes and Family Treats. I had never made a bakewell tart before, and it's a traditional English tart made with a layer of shortcrust pastry, a layer of jam, and then a layer frangipane. In this case, the jam is an Amaretto cherry jam and the frangipane has a little splash of Amaretto too. Oh and it's topped with beautiful flaked almonds for a nice toasty crunch. It's wonderful, and decadent without being too rich. Also, amaretto. Just. It's everything. More things should have amaretto. Without further ado, here's some beautiful pictures and the recipe.

Quick note: the recipe will be in metric units as the book was written and published in London. If you don't already have one, get yourself a kitchen scale! It makes things so easy!

Cherry Amaretto Bakewell Tart

Short Crust 

• 100g turbinado sugar
• 100g unsalted butter
• 4 egg yolks
• 175g plain flour
• 25g ground almonds
• pinch of salt

Jam

• 200g frozen cherries
• 100g turbinado sugar
• 2 tbsp Amaretto liqueur
• grated zest of 1 lemon

Filling

• 120g unsalted butter, softened
• 120g turbinado sugar
• 1 tbsp Amaretto liqueur
• 2 eggs
• 120g ground almonds
• pinch of salt
• finely grated zest of 1 lemon
• 1 tbsp plain flour
• 30g flaked almonds

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350℉.
2. For the short crust, beat together the sugar and butter in the bowl of a stand mixer until fluffy and pale. Beat in egg yolks, followed by flour, ground almonds, and salt. Bring together with your hands to form a ball of dough. Flatten into disc and wrap in cling film and chill for 30 minutes.
3. Roll out the pastry on a floured work surface to 3-4mm thick. Lift with a rolling pin and drape into a 9 inch loose-bottomed fluted tart tin. Gently press the pastry into the flutes and remove the excess pastry so it is just at the top of the tin. Prick the bottom of the crust with a fork.
4. Line the pie with parchment paper and fill with dry beans, or blind baking beans. Blind bake the crust for 15 minutes then remove the parchment paper and beans and bake for a further 5-10 minutes until set and golden. Set aside to cool. Leave oven on, but turn the temperature up to 375℉.
5. Next up, the jam. Place a plate in the freezer. Put the frozen cherries, sugar, Amaretto, and lemon zest in a small sauce pan. Set over a low heat and stir to dissolve the sugar. Turn up the heat and allow to bubble away for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, then test to see if it has set. Remove the pan from the heat and spoon a blob of hot jam onto the frozen plate. Leave for a few seconds, then run your finger through the jam - if the surface wrinkles, the jam is ready. If it doesn't, return to the heat and bubble for a further 5 minutes, then test again. Set aside to cool.
6. For the frangipane filling, beat together the butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add the Amaretto and eggs, then mix in the ground almonds, salt, lemon zest and flour.
7. Up next, assembly! Spread the cherry jam evenly in the baked pastry crust. Top with the almond filling and level out with a spatula. Sprinkle the flaked almonds over the filing. Bake for 35-40 minutes until the filling is just set and the almonds look toasted and golden. Cool before serving.