Use to make tarts or tartlets to fill with fresh summer fruits and cream, or for making short vanilla biscuits.

200g/ 7 oz unsalted butter cubes
100g/ 3½ oz caster sugar
2 tbsp beaten egg
½ tsp vanilla or dark rum
300g/ 11 oz flour

Use the dough hooks. The butter should be a soft, almost melting consistency.

In a medium sized bowl, using medium to high speed, mix the butter and sugar until creamy and you can see the trail of the dough hooks.

Add the egg and vanilla, beating until the egg is absorbed.

Add the flour and mix on medium speed until the dough starts to cling round the dough hooks in large chunks.

Working in the coolest conditions possible, tip the dough out onto a counter and gather it up in your hands, squeezing it gently to form a smooth sausage shape, with no cracks. Handle it lightly or it may get oily.
Chill for a couple of hours in the fridge before rolling out.

To make a tart case

Preheat oven to 160C/310F/M2-3.

Line the tin with pastry and trim off the edges neatly.
Bake the case blind: line the pastry with baking parchment or foil (larger than thecase so that it comes up the sides) and fill with rice or baking beans.

Bake for 30 minutes

Remove rice/beans andparchment/foil and return to the oven for a further 20 to 30 minutes at 170C/325F/M3 to dry
out – keep an eye on it as you do not want it to turn dark brown.

Cool before filling with whipped Double Cream and fresh fruit e.g. strawberries, raspberries, blueberries etc.

Serve Immediately

To make individual tartlets or biscuits

Preheat oven to 170C/325F/M3.

Grease a tartlet tray. For biscuits, line a baking tray with baking parchment. Cut the pastry into circles with a cookie cutter, place on the tray and bake for 7-10 minutes, or until dry.

Sprinkle biscuits with caster sugar as they come out of the oven.