Spiced Rhubarb Meringue Tarts

These lightly Spiced Rhubarb Meringue Tarts are a fun take on the classic lemon meringue! There bursting with different flavours and textures, the beautiful fresh spring rhubarb is encased in a buttery pastry shell and topped with pillows of soft meringue. Some may say the perfect finish to any meal and I would wholeheartedly agree!

Makes 4 individual tarts

Ingredients

Sweet pastry

• 125g butter
• 125g caster sugar
• 1 medium egg
• 250g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Spiced Rhubarb compote

• 6 rhubarb stalks
• 150ml water
• 25g caster sugar
• 2 cardamom seeds (crushed)
• 1 vanilla pod

Meringue

• 200g egg white
• 200g caster sugar
• 200g icing sugar
• 20g cornflour

Method

Sweet pastry

1. Cream the butter and sugar together until pale in colour.
2. Add the egg and vanilla, combine.
3. Finally, add the flour. Do not over mix at this stage.
4. Turn the mix out onto a floured surface, gently knead to form a ball.
5. Wrap in cling and chill for a minimum of 30 minutes.
6. When rested, return to the floured surface and roll out.
7. Grease and flour your 4 individual baking tart moulds and carefully cover with the rolled out pastry.
8. Check that there are no cracks or holes and trim off the excess pastry. Chill for 25 minutes.
9. Line the tart shell’s with parchment and fill with baking beans and bind bake in a pre-heated oven at 165ºC for 8-10 minutes, remove the baking beans and return the tart to the oven for a further 4-5 minutes to finish baking or until golden brown.
10. Set aside to cool

* Note: Any extra raw pastry can be wrapped and frozen until needed again

Spiced Rhubarb compote

1. Wash and cut the stalks into bite sized pieces.
2. Place these in a pot with the sugar, water, cardamom and the split and scraped vanilla pod and cook over a gentle heat until the pieces soften but don’t loose there shape.
3. Remove from the pot and cool.

Meringue

1. The meringue is very simple, in a clean, dry bowl whisk the whites until double in size and leave a track of the whisk, gradually add the caster sugar and continue to mix on high speed until thick.
2. Finally add the icing sugar and corn flour, mix again on high speed and the end result will be an extremely thick and glossy meringue.

Assembly

1. Spoon the rhubarb compote into the pre baked tart shells.
2. You can either pipe on the meringue or spoon it on for a messier “agricultural” look.
3. Place in a preheated oven set at 200ºC for a few minutes until the tips of the meringue turn a golden brown colour.
4. Serve & most importantly enjoy!