Sweet Potato Tart

Are you a sweet potato lover? I am. I especially love those purple peel with yellow flesh ones. I do eat orange flesh and purple flesh sweet potatoes but do not like them that much. To me, the texture of the first one is too soft and the latter is too rough. There is also slight different in term of their taste and aroma.

Been eating steamed sweet potatoes quite often lately, either as snacks or part of meals. I used to steam them with some sugar and pinch of salt, but now without any seasoning for a healthier choice. Guess what? I am loving them this way now. But, today I am trying out a new recipe with this humble ingredient.

Here is the recipe, you can either make a big tart or some individual tarts. I made 12 mini tarts and 6 regular size tarts with this recipe. I toasted the meringue for a few minutes to brown the surface a little but the result was not as good as the one browned with a torch. By the way, this Italian meringue (aka cooked meringue) is safe to eat without further cooking.

Ingredients (12 pcs - regular):

Pastry:

60g butter, room temp

40g caster sugar

1 egg yolk

120g all purpose flour

¼ tsp vanilla essence

Filling:

150ml sweetened condensed milk (+- to your taste)

200g mashed sweet potato

1 tbsp brown sugar (optional)

1 egg

¼ tsp ground cinnamon

¼ tsp ground nutmeg

¼ tsp ground ginger

Pinch of salt

Meringue: (optional)

1 egg white

Pinch of cream of tartar

¼ cup caster sugar

2 tbsp water

Directions:

1. Pastry: Beat together butter and sugar until creamy. Add in egg yolk and vanilla essence, and mix well. Add in flour gradually and knead briefly to form soft dough. Cover with plastic wrap and set aside for later use.
2. Filling: In a large mixing bowl, whisk together all ingredients until smooth paste is formed.
3. Assemble: Roll out the pastry into 5mm thickness, cut and place/fit the pastry into greased muffin tin. Fill each pastry with filling to the almost full level.
4. Bake tarts at 170degreeC (preheated oven) for 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on rack.
5. Meringue: Boil sugar with water in a small sauce pan until sugar is melted, keep it hot with the low heat. Meanwhile, prepare meringue as usual. Once the soft peak is formed, pour in the hot syrup slowly while beating with medium speed. Continue to beat until stiff peak is formed.