Light Lemon Tart

Elegant, very French-feeling and deep-filled without being too sweet. Lighter on the digestion than a classic lemon tart because it leans on dairy and zest rather than acid and sugar.

> Elegant, very French-feeling, deep-filled. Not too sweet. Lighter for digestion than a classic lemon tart because it leans on dairy and zest rather than acid and sugar.

Ingredients

Pastry

• Use the sweet GF tart pastry (see Bakewell base recipe — same approach: 140g Doves Farm Freee plain flour, 70g cold butter, 1 egg yolk, 1½–2½ tbsp cold water, pinch salt). Thinly rolled and fully blind baked.

Filling

• zest of 2 lemons
• 120ml lemon juice (reduce to ~100ml for a softer, more aromatic tart — see notes)
• 150ml whole milk
• 120ml single cream
• 90g crème fraîche
• 3 eggs
• 2 yolks
• 70g caster sugar
• 10g cornflour
• 1 gelatine leaf (optional — for an extra silky set)
• pinch of salt
• tiny splash of vanilla

Method

1. Blind bake the pastry

• Roll between baking paper, line a deep 20cm tart tin, prick base, chill 15 min.
• Bake at 190°C / 170°C fan with paper + beans for 15 min, then 5–7 min uncovered until base is dry and lightly golden.
• Drop oven to 140–150°C fan.

2. Infuse the dairy

• Warm the milk, cream and lemon zest gently to a steam (not boil). Take off heat. Leave 10 min to infuse.

3. Whisk the base

• Whisk eggs, yolks, sugar and cornflour in a bowl until smooth.

4. Combine

• Strain the warm dairy into the egg mix, whisking constantly.
• Whisk in the crème fraîche, vanilla, salt and (if using) the bloomed-and-melted gelatine leaf.
• Add the lemon juice last, slowly, whisking gently.

5. Bake low and slow

• Pour the filling into the warm tart shell.
• Bake at 140–150°C fan for 35–45 min. The centre should still wobble slightly when you nudge the tin.

6. Chill

• Cool fully at room temp, then chill overnight before slicing.

Notes

• Deep-fill rule: the deeper the tart, the more it becomes custard rather than pure citrus. Slightly reduce the juice (to ~100ml) and increase zest if you want aromatic lemon flavour without aggressive acidity. Sits better digestively too.
• Wobble matters: if it's set firm in the oven it'll be over-set when chilled — pull it while the centre still moves.

How this works (the science)

This recipe is doing four jobs at once: keeping it gluten-free, keeping the sugar low, keeping the fat moderate, and keeping it gentle on the gut.

• Gluten replaced by Doves Farm Freee plain flour + cornflour in the pastry. GF flour blends are weaker than wheat — they have no gluten network to give pastry its short, crisp snap. The high butter ratio (70g into 140g flour = 50%) compensates by coating the starch granules so they stay tender and don't go cardboardy. Chilling the dough lets the butter firm up so it stays in flakes during baking, mimicking the structure gluten would normally provide.
• Cornflour in the filling does double duty. It thickens custards at a lower egg ratio than flour alone, meaning you need less egg fat overall. It also stabilises the proteins so the curd stays silky rather than weeping.
• Lower sugar (70g for a deep tart) is possible because of the dairy buffer. Milk + cream + crème fraîche dilute the lemon's acidity, so you don't need sugar to mask sharpness. In a classic tarte au citron, sugar is doing acid-management work. Here the dairy does it.
• Three dairies, three jobs. Whole milk = body without weight. Single cream = creaminess at lower fat than double. Crème fraîche = a small acid hit that helps the custard set + adds depth without needing more sugar.
• Egg whites + yolks + zest infused in warm dairy = flavour without volume. Zest contains the lemon oils (terpenes), which are aromatic but not acidic. Infusing them in warm dairy extracts the flavour into fat — much more potent than juice alone, so you can use less juice.
• Optional gelatine leaf gives extra silky set without needing to push the eggs higher (more eggs = more eggy flavour + more fat).
• Low + slow oven (140–150°C fan). High heat scrambles the egg proteins and you get a grainy, split custard. Low heat lets the proteins set gently and gives the silk-textured filling.

Variations

• Swap lemon for lime + a touch of basil zest for a sharper, herby version.
• Add a layer of raspberries on the base before pouring the filling for a tart-fruit contrast.