Sweet Pastry Crust

This tastes like a cookie! Rich, sweet, and yummy. It can be refrigerated and stored for days, or even frozen and kept for rainy days when you need to prepare a quick dessert. The best part about this recipe is that it doesn't require rolling pins to roll out the dough (one less thing to wash!).

Note: 

• It requires some time for chilling the dough during preparation so you need to set aside time for that. 
• Be careful not to push up the movable base of the tart after you have pressed the dough into it (hold the sides).

Makes a 8-9 inch sweet pastry crust.

Ingredients:

195 grams (1 1/2 cups) all purpose/plain flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
113 grams (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature

50 grams (1/4 cups) granulated white sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten

You will also need:

Tart pan(s)

Cling wrap

Preparation:

• Whisk the flour and salt together.
• Grease and flour a 8 - 9 inch tart pan with a removable bottom (I only greased and it worked too)
• To bring the butter quickly to room temperature right after taking out of the fridge, i usually use the beaters to "cut" the butter into smaller pieces and leave it for about 5 to 10 minutes before beating.

1. Cream the butter on low speed for about 1 - 2 minutes to soften it.

2. Add the sugar and beat on high speed for about 3 - 5 minutes until light and fluffy.

2. Switch the beater to low speed and add the beaten egg to the mixture gradually, in 4 additions.

3. Once all the egg is incorporated, add in all the flour and mix until the mixture just comes together (the dough almost forms a ball, and all the flour is mixed in).

Use a spatula to scrap down the sides, and smooth out the dough into a ball.

4. Spread out a cling wrap on a clean tabletop, and press the dough into a disk about the size of your tart pan. I used a 6 inch and 4 inch pan instead so i separated the dough roughly into a big and small disc.

5. Cling wrap the discs, then place them on a plate and put it into the fridge for 15 - 30 minutes (or freezer for 10-15 minutes).

6. Take the dough out from the fridge and press the dough into your prepared tart pan using your fingers, spreading the dough out as evenly as possible. This dough do not need rolling out, as it tends to crack if you do that. Cling wrap the pans with dough then put it into the freezer for 15 minutes.

7. At this point, preheat your oven to 204 degree Celsius (400 degree Fahrenheit).

8. Take the pans(s) with dough out of the fridge. Use a fork and lightly prick the bottom of the pastry crust. This prevents the crust from puffing up and cracking when it bakes.

9. Place the tart pan(s) on a larger baking pan on a larger baking sheet and bake at 204 degree Celsius for 5 minutes. Then reduce the temperature to 176 degree Celsius (350 degree Fahrenheit) till the crust is dry and lightly browned (mine took about 6 minutes for the 4 inch one and 10 minutes for the 6 inch one).

10. Let the crust FULLY COOL before removing them from the pan! Otherwise it might crack.

This recipe is taken from Joyofbaking. There's a great video showing the preparation for this from the start to end. You may use the pastry crust for making fruit tarts.

Enjoy :)