Trentham Tart (A Cake Tart Recipe)

Partially sliced Trentham tart topped with glacé icing, glacé cherries and walnuts.

5 from 2 votes

Trentham Tart (A Cake Tart Recipe)

Trentham tart is an old-English recipe for a jam sponge tart. It consists of shortcrust pastry slathered in raspberry jam and topped with vanilla sponge cake. This cake tart is adorned with glacé icing and distinctively decorated with candied cherries and walnuts.

Prep Time30

Cook Time1

Total Time1 30

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: British

Diet: Vegetarian

Servings:

Calories: 458kcal

Author: Jane Coupland

Equipment

1 x 8-inch (20cm) circular tart tin preferably with a loose bottom to make it easy to remove the tart once it has baked.

Ingredients

For the shortcrust pastry

150 g Plain flour all purpose
90 g Butter cold
30 g Icing sugar
¼ teaspoon Salt
2-3 tablespoons Water ice-cold

For the filling

125 g Raspberry jam
120 g Plain flour all purpose
60 g Butter (or baking margarine) room temperature
60 g Caster sugar
1 Egg large, free-range
1½ teaspoons Vanilla extract
1 tablespoon Milk
1 teaspoon Baking powder

For the top

150 g Icing sugar
1 teaspoon Lemon juice (optional)
Water cold
9 Glacé cherries candied cherries
9 Walnut halves

Instructions

Make the shortcrust pastry

Stir the flour, icing sugar and salt together in a bowl. Cube the butter and drop it in.
Use your fingertips to rub the fat into the other ingredients until it resembles breadcrumbs. Stir in 2-3 tablespoons of the ice-cold water adding just enough to form a soft but not sticky dough.
Use your hand to gently pull the dough into a ball.
Knead the dough briefly on a lightly floured worktop then flatten it into a disc, wrap it and chill it in the fridge for 30 minutes.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 180℃/ 350℉ and put a baking sheet in to warm up.
Roll the dough out to a thickness of 2-3mm and line the baking tin with it. Chill for 20 minutes then prick the base all over with a fork.
Fill the pastry case with baking parchment and baking beans. Bake for 20 minutes, then remove the baking beans and parchment and bake for another 10 minutes.

Prepare the filling

Cream the butter and sugar together until they are light & fluffy then beat in the egg.
Add the vanilla extract & milk and beat again.
Sieve the flour, baking powder & salt into the bowl and fold it in using a large metal spoon.
Spread the jam over the baked pastry case. Spoon the sponge batter over the jam and spread it to the edge of the pastry case covering the jam entirely.
Bake the tart for 30 minutes until the sponge is golden and feels light and spongy when pressed with a finger. Let it cool completely.

Decoration

Mix the icing sugar with the lemon juice and just enough water to form a thick icing that can be spread over the top of the sponge. Start with 2 teaspoons of water and keep adding more in ¼ teaspoon increments until the desired consistency is reached.
Press the cherries and walnuts into the icing before it sets. Place eight of each around the edge then put a whole cherry into the centre. Place 2 walnut halves (or a half cut into 2) on either side of the cherry.

Notes

You can use store-bought sweet shortcrust pastry (approximately 300g) if you don’t want to make your own.
The most accurate way to measure ingredients for baking is with digital scales and gram measurements. The cup measuring system is wildly inaccurate so I don’t recommend it.
The ingredients listed require an 8-inch (20cm) circular baking tin. If you use a smaller or larger tin there will either be too much or too little of the ingredients to fill it properly.
When blind baking pastry tart cases using a dark tin and placing the tin on a hot baking sheet in the oven helps to ensure the base is properly cooked
Wait until your sponge tart has cooled fully before adding the glacé icing, otherwise it will soak in.
Omit the walnuts if you are serving it to anybody with a nut-allergy. It won’t be a Trentham tart if you do, but it will still be a very tasty jam sponge tart.
Store your tart in an airtight container at room temperature. If it has been cut into press food wrap or foil against any exposed sponge cake to prevent it from drying out. Consume it within 2 days.

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