Sweet short crust pastry can be used either as a tart crust, or to make cookies. Fill a tart with delicious custard or decorate your cookies with a dip of dark chocolate.
Prep Time: 30 Minutes
Cook Time: 15 Minutes
Total Time: 45 Minutes
Yield: 2 large tart crusts or 24 cookies
Special Equipment: Rolling Pin.
Ingredients:
150g soft butter
30g sugar
1 egg
240g flour
Directions:
Preheat your oven to 180°C/160°C/Gas Mark 4.
Cream butter and sugar together with a wooden spoon in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy.
Add the egg and mix until well combined.
Add the flour and mix together until it becomes a dough. You can knead it a bit with your hands to help it come together.
Wrap it in cling film and chill in a fridge for at least 20 minutes.
Slightly flour a large surface and remove the chilled dough from the fridge. Use a rolling pin to roll the dough until it's as thick as a £1 coin.
For the tart crust: roll half of the dough and place it in a tart tin. Press gently to the bottom and sides and cut out excess of the dough. You can place baking parchment on top and fill with beans for blind baking. Bake for 15 minutes. Carefully remove the parchment with beans and bake for 5 minutes longer, until the bottom of the tart crust is golden brown.
For the cookies: roll the dough and place it on a baking parchment. Using a cookies cutters cut cookie shapes and remove the excess of the dough. You want to have 2mm distance between the cookies. Bake until golden brown for approximately 10-15 minutes (depending on the size of the cookies).
When baked, leave it to cool before using.
Tips:
For the perfect shape when you make cookies, try not to move them after you cut shapes out with the cookies cutter. Remove excess of the dough, but try not to move the cookies.
To decorate the cookies you can melt some chocolate and drizzle over the cookies or dip in chocolate and set in a fridge.
For the tart, you can fill the raw dough then bake the crust and filling together (depending on the filling recipe).
