I like foraging. Although I hardly do any foraging myself I like the idea of it. Of course I hate the recent new foragers who never consider how nature’s cycle works and remove all mushrooms they can find from the area even before mushrooms open the umbrella. It is becoming a great threat to forests in the UK. That is outrageous! Nothing remains in the forest if people keep doing this.

That is not what I do. My foraging is much more in a smaller scale … such as Blackberry Picking. However, it does not seem a good season for Blackberry this year. It might be the problem where I live but I could get only handful of them.

Anyway, there is a sweet I always make in Blackberry season.

Blackberry Custard Tart

 [Ingredients]

(Pâte Sucrée, Tart)

• 100g of Plain Flour
• 60g of Unsalted Butter
• 35g of Powder Sugar
• 15g of Almond Powder
• 20g of Egg (Beaten)

(Filling)

• 200-25og of Fresh Blackberries
• 1 Tbsp. of brown Sugar (additional)

(Custard)

• 4 Yolk
• 80g of Granulated Sugar
• 24g of Plain Flour
• 24g of Corn Flour
• 400ml of Milk
• 1 Tbsp. of Unsalted Butter
• 1 Tsp. of Vanilla Extract
• 1 Tbsp. of Brandy

[Direction]

(Make ‘Pâte Sucrée, Tart’) Mix butter, sugar and flour and combine well with your fingers. When it becomes crumbly add in beaten egg and mix well. Make it into a flat round shape and rest it in the refrigerator after wrapping it with cling film for 30 minutes

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and roll it out to the size of the tart tin you are going to use. Place it inside the tart tin and make some pricks at the bottom with a fork and blind bake it with some baking stone inside for about 10 minutes at 180℃. Make sure the edge of the tart does not get burnt. Leave it to cool down

(Make ‘Custard’) Place yolk and Sugar in a glass bowl and mix well with a whisk until the mixture becomes airy and whitish colour. Add in Plain flour and Corn Flour and combine well

Heat Milk in a cooking pan at medium heat. Remove the pan from the heat before it starts boiling. Add the hot milk into the mixture little by little and mix it well

Return the mixture into the pan which you used for warming milk through a sieve. Start heating it with a medium-high heat. Keep starring the mixture with a whisk until it starts getting thickened

When the mixture starts becoming thicker remove the pan off the hob and add in Butter. Transfer the custard onto a vat or a clean bowl. Place cling film on the surface and leave it in room temperature until it cools down

When the mixture becomes cool add in Vanilla Extract and Brandy and mix well

(Making Tart) Preheat the oven at 180℃. In the Tart case place fresh Blackberries spreading out up to 60-80% maximum of the tart case height

*Sprinkle Brown Sugar over the Blackberries if you think the berries are too tangy

Place the tart tin on a baking tray. Pour cool Custard over Blackberries up to just below the edge. Place the tray with the tart tin into the oven for about 30-40 minutes until the Custard starts bubbling a little. Remove the tin from the Oven and cool it down by keeping the tart in the tart tin

*If the edge of the Tart case is getting too dark during the bake cover it with a Aluminium sheet

Chill the Tart in the Tart Tin in the refrigerator overnight. Remove the tart from the tin onto a plate and serve it at the table

The custard was a bit too soft this time and it avalanched out to the side when you put a knife to it, however, it tasted great as usual.

Here is the previous one I made. 😉