Dat Tat (Hong Kong Egg Custard Tarts)

These little dessert tarts often seen on a dim sum cart are actually relatively new. Wiki says they started showing up around the 40's, and they bear striking resemblance to a Portuguese tart called "Pastel de nata." They are really great, light, not too sweet, delicious.

Ingredients

Crust:

• 3 cups flour, sifted
• 1 1/2 sticks butter, cut into cubes
• warm water (5-6 tbsp)
• pinch of salt

Custard filling:

• 3 Eggs
• 1 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups milk

Method

In a bowl or pyrex cup with a spout, beat eggs, mix in milk and vanilla, and dissolve sugar. Set aside.

With dough cutter, cut butter into flour until mixture resembles pebbles. Gradually add warm water a tablespoon at a time until dough just barely comes together. Refrain from adding too much water. It should still feel quite fragile and should just barely hold itself together. Preheat oven to 425F. Dump onto a big work surface and lightly knead a few times to form a ball. Cut ball into halves and roll out to about a 1/4" thick. Grease tart molds, mini cupcake tins, or full size cupcake tins. Cut out an appropriately sized circle to line the inside of your mold of choice, if using full size cupcake molds, you may want to only go up about 2/3rds of the way up the wall. Pour filling into crusts and fill to about 1 mm below the top, a pyrex cup with spout is great for this. Place in the oven for 10 min. Then rotate the trays, reduce heat to 375F, and bake for another 10-15 minutes or until just barely set. As with all egg things, done in the pan means overdone on the plate so you want the centers to still be just a little bit wiggly but not runny. Pull them and cool in molds for about 10 min, then remove and cool on rack to room temperature.