Mini Strawberry Tartlets With Cream Cheese Filling

With my recipe for Mini Strawberry Tartlets with Cream Cheese Filling, you can make a dozen of these beauties to transport yourself and your loved ones to a distant land of bakery bliss - no passport required!

⭐ Why You’ll Love This Recipe 

With spring on its way and love in the air, it’s hard not to crave the classic combination of strawberries and cream. These delicious single-sized strawberry tartlets give the quintessential pairing a delightfully modern twist.

Buttery, almond-flecked short pastry crusts are layered with strawberry jam and a sweet whipped cream cheese filling before being topped with garnet red slices of fresh strawberries and delicate chamomile flowers. SWOON!

While the process of making tarts is a bit time intensive, the result is well worth it. And remember, you are more than welcome to break up the recipe into smaller tasks! The baked tart shells will last for up to two months in your freezer, giving you plenty of time and space to fill them at your leisure.

Finally, if strawberries aren’t your favorite, feel free to swap in a berry of your choosing. I find the cheesecake-esque tart filling pairs beautifully with almost any fruit - a variety of berries, cherries, figs, and currants (to name a few) are just begging to be eaten in such a fashionable, Parisian way!

🍴Ingredients 

• Vanilla Paste - While you should feel free to use vanilla extract instead, I love the gorgeous flecks of vanilla bean that the paste offers. 
• Almond Flour - While you can’t make the swap if you’re making another pâtisserie favorite, macarons, you are welcome to use coarser almond meal here instead.
• Bread Flour - Bread flour has more protein in it than all-purpose (9-11% vs 11-13%, respectively). More protein helps to provide extra gluten (read: structure) to your shells. If you don’t have bread flour on hand, feel free to use AP instead, but opt for a brand with a higher protein content if possible.
• Cream Cheese - When it comes to French pastry, there is no such thing as low fat. Be sure you’re opting for the good stuff here!
• Sliced Strawberries - Feel free to swap in your favorite berries (or other fruits!) here instead. The cream cheese filling tastes a lot like cheesecake, so use your best judgement. Don't forget, you can use extra strawberries to whip up strawberry-infused treats like strawberry juice, strawberry coulis, strawberry vodka lemonade or strawberry rice krispie treats!
• Strawberry Jam - Any preserves should work well here, so long as they aren’t too thick. Just remember to think about what fruit you’ll be topping the tartlets with so the flavors are harmonious.
• Chamomile Flowers - While optional, I love the dainty, daisy-like appearance of these darling flowers. They also happen to be entirely edible!

🛠️ Equipment

• Electric Mixer - If you do a lot of baking, do your arms a favor and invest in a sturdy electric mixer. 
• Rolling Pin - While there are many varieties of rolling pins on the market, I’m partial to a plain, wooden rolling pin; if it’s good enough for the French pastry masters, it’s good enough for me! In a pinch, you can make an empty wine bottle work, too.
• Mini Tart Rings - I personally find that mini tart rings are perfectly easy to work with, despite not having bottoms. If you have tartlet molds with false bottoms like a regular sized tart shell, those will work just as well! You can also feel free to swap in one large format tart pan instead.
• Pie Weights - If you don’t have dedicated pie weights on hand, dry rice or dry beans will do the trick nicely. You can use the rice/beans repeatedly as pie weights, but note that they should not be cooked to be eaten after they are used in this manner.

📖 Step by Step Instructions

Before you get intimidated by looking at the long prep list here, remember two things: 

1. You can easily break this up into smaller tasks. Tart dough can be made and frozen in advance. Baked tart shells can be made and frozen for up to 2 months. The cream cheese filling can be made up to a week in advance before piping in.
2. None of the steps are particularly difficult, they just take patience. So if you’re getting overwhelmed, take a step back, take a deep breath, maybe pour yourself a cocktail, and remember: you’ve got this!

Make Mini Tart Shells

If you’re new to making tart dough, head on over to this Tart how-to-guide!

Mixing the dough: In a stand mixer using a paddle attachment, start by mixing sugar, butter, vanilla paste, salt, almond and all-purpose flour, mixing until combined. Take a moment to scrape the mixing bowl to ensure all butter and flour are incorporated.

Add room temperature eggs one at a time, mixing between additions. Add bread flour, making sure to not overmix. Turn the machine off as soon as the flour is *just* incorporated.

Chilling the dough: Wrap dough tightly in plastic wrap, then place in the fridge to chill before using for at least one hour. I tend to make my tart dough ahead of time so I throw it in the fridge until the next day.

If using this method, remove your dough from the fridge 30 minutes before you plan to roll it out – you’ll find that it will be MUCH easier to work with!

Rolling and forming the tart dough: Once your dough is rolled to the desired thickness (about ¼ “), press gently into the bottom of your mini tart pans or rings, poking the bottom of the tart LIBERALLY with a fork, and place in the freezer to chill for 20-30 minutes. This is essential – your tart shells are less likely to shrink while baking if you take the time to freeze them.

Baking Mini Tart Shells: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line the shells with parchment paper and baking rice/beans/pie weights to further prevent the dough from puffing up. Bake until edges become ever so slightly browned - this should take about 20-25 minutes - then remove from the oven and allow to cool. 

Make Whipped Cream Cheese Filling 

Mixing: Beat together the softened butter and cream cheese on medium speed until it’s smooth and somewhat fluffy with a hand mixer. Scrape down the sides, then slowly add in the powdered sugar and vanilla paste. Place cream cheese filling in a plastic bag or pastry bag and cut off the tip to prepare for assembling the tarts!

Assembly 

Filling: Pipe or spoon in a few tablespoons of jam into your tart shell, smoothing it across the bottom of each shell. Then pipe the whipped cream cheese filling on top. 

Garnish: Add sliced strawberries on top of the cream cheese as garnish, gently fanning them out before brushing the tops of the strawberries with strawberry jam. Place a few edible flowers on top and enjoy!

Looking to create delicious and homemade garnishes to elevate your creations? Try adding Sugared Flowers, Candied Rose Petals, Dried Orange Slices or Sugared berries!

👩🏻‍🍳 Expert Tips

• Don’t overmix. Overmixing the dough will result in the development of too much gluten, which will tighten during the baking process and cause your tart shells to shrink. As you add the bread flour, watch closely. You should turn off the mixer as soon as it is just barely incorporated.
• Rest the dough. When you are first learning to work with pastry, its entirely possible you might overwork the dough a tad; that’s part of your education! After you make the dough a few times, you’ll be a pro. In the meantime, though, remember to rest your dough! This allows the gluten to relax some before you roll and cut it.
• Flour your work surface. After all of your hard work creating the perfect tart dough and rolling it to the perfect thickness (¼ “ in my book), the last thing you want is for your dough to stick to your work surface. If you’re worried about being heavy handed with the flour, use a handheld mesh strainer to help you mete it out more conservatively.
• Freeze before baking. This is a non-negotiable step!! Make sure you give your tartlet shells *at least* 20-30 minutes to firm up in the freezer before baking. This will help prevent shrinking while baking, which in turn will give you more professional looking pastries.
• Pie weights are necessary. Blind baking is an essential step for making desserts with unbaked fillings (like this one), or for those fillings that have a shorter bake time than the crusts. While poking holes in the crust will help the steam to escape, keeping the crust weighted down will ensure that your tart looks clean and professional.

Use my step-by-step guide to for more tips and tricks on making homemade tarts!

⏲️ Substitutions & Variations

• Use almond extract in place of vanilla. Want to double down on the almond flavor? Swap in half as much almond extract for the vanilla.
• Swap out the strawberries and strawberry jam for a different fruit or pastry cream of your choosing. If you are allergic to strawberries, don’t like them, or can’t find any good ones at the store, make an executive decision and swap in another fruit in its place. Raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, currants, figs, apricots… the options are endless!
• Make a large format strawberry tart instead of mini tartlets. Have a tart pan but no mini tart rings? No problem! Simply make a regular-sized strawberry tart instead.

💭 Recipe FAQs

More Summer Recipes To Try

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