I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I’ll say it again: If I were to ever open a bakery, I’d name is The Cheeky Little Tart. For some reason, I just find that funny. 🙂 And today, I made this cheeky little tart. My roommate has been working crazy long hours and I thought thought that maybe she would appreciate a little pie in her life. And she loves blueberries. Pie cures most ills, as I always say (although in her case, maybe sleep would be good too!)
Ingredients
for the pastry
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/3 cup chilled solid vegetable shortening, diced
6 tablespoons (or more) ice water
for the filling
1/2 cup granulated sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 tablespoon. fresh lemon juice
Pinch table salt
4 cups fresh blueberries, stemmed, rinsed, and dried
1 egg mixted with 2 tablespoons water, for egg wash
2-3 tablespoons salted bourbon vanilla sugar (recipe can be found here), for sprinkling*
Directions
Blend flour, sugar and salt in processor. Add butter and shortening and cut in using pulse function until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add 6 tablespoons ice water and process until moist clumps form, adding more water by teaspoonfuls if dough is dry. Gather into ball; divide into 2 pieces. Flatten each into disk. Wrap each in plastic; chill 2 hours.
Position rack in lowest third of oven and preheat to 400F. Mix together sugar, corn starch, lemon juice and spices in a medium bowl. Add blueberries and toss to blend.
Roll out 1 dough disk on floured surface to 12-inch round. Transfer to 9-inch-diameter pie dish or tart pan. Fold edge under, forming high-standing rim; crimp. Add filling. Roll out second dough disk on floured surface. Using a 2 inch round cookie cutter, cut out enough mini-rounds to cover the surface of the pie (I needed about 40). Cover the entire surface of the filled pie, overlapping to create a fan pattern. Using a pasty brush, brush surface with the egg was and sprinkle on salted bourbon vanilla sugar.
Place pie on a rimmed baking sheet (to catch any juices if the pie overflows) and place in oven and bake pie 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 375F. Continue baking until juices bubble thickly between the top rounds and crust is deep golden, covering edges with foil if browning too quickly, about 1 hour. Let pie cool a minimum of 2 hours before cutting. This is important as the pie filling will be pretty loose. If you want to serve warm pie, reheat pieces individually.
*You can also use regular raw (large grain) sugar, if you don’t have the salted bourbon vanilla sugar handy.
