So You Wanna Make Pies? Yeah, Right.
Everyone keeps goin’ on about “best desserts” with shortcrust pastry like it’s some kinda magic trick. “Top Picks”? Sure, if you don’t mind a kitchen warzone. Let me tell ya how it actually goes down.
Fired up the oven, feeling ambitious. Grabbed the flour, butter, all that jazz. Figured, hey, how hard can tart shells be? Mixed the dough, okay? Supposed to be crumbly, they say. Mine? More like wet cement glued to my fingers. Whole mess stuck like crazy glue. Couldn’t even see the bowl underneath. Flour everywhere. I mean everywhere. Looked like a blizzard hit the counter.
Eventually wrestled it into some kinda shape. Chilled it, like the fancy folks online said. Pulled it out later, rock solid. Tried rolling it. Thing cracked like an old sidewalk. Patched it together with wet dough scraps, looked like Frankenstein’s pastry. Slapped it into the tin. Edges were thicker than my thumb in some spots, paper-thin in others. Already knew this wasn’t gonna be pretty.
Blind baking time! Poured in the beans. Middle of the oven. Smelled kinda nice… for a minute. Then whoosh! Leak! Buttery goo drippin’ straight onto the oven floor. Smoke alarm sings the song of my people. Fan on, windows open, waving a towel like a lunatic. Got it out, looked pathetic – soggy bottom, puffed up like a balloon where it wasn’t leaking. “Perfectly golden” my foot. More like sad and patchy beige.
Thought I’d salvage it. Filled one with some lemon curd I bought. Tasted… well, the lemon was nice. The pastry? Like eating cardboard with a vague buttery afterthought. Made some jam tarts too. Dolloped the jam on my sad, blind-baked shells. Jam bubbled over, glued some of ’em to the tray. Others stayed suspiciously liquid in the middle while the pastry edge tried to char.
Total haul? One semi-okay lemon tart that looked like it survived a disaster movie, a few passable jam tarts if you don’t look close, and a whole army of rejects. The rejects crumbled when touched. Some jam tarts fused together in solidarity. Kitchen still smells faintly of burnt butter and regret.
So yeah, “Best Desserts”? Here’s my real top picks:
- Lemon Tart Where The Pastry Didn’t Leak Too Much (Small Miracle Division)
- Jam Tarts That Kinda Hold Their Shape (Minimal Jam Fusion Category)
- The One Slice No One Actually Ate But I Pretend Looks Good (Aesthetics Only Award)
Truth bomb: Making this stuff look effortless takes either witchcraft or hiding the evidence really well. My practice record today leans heavily towards the latter. Shortcrust pastry demands respect. Mostly it gives you a messy kitchen and a lesson in humility. Tastes okay under enough lemon curd, though. Just don’t look at the bottom.
