Tradition with cream

I have slightly depressed myself contemplating that perhaps blogging about Bakewell tart might not be the best use of a Thursday night. I have no pictures of the recreation of this English traditional pudding because it disappeared too quickly. I should learn from this that if I am to successfully document my experiences with food a ready camera at table is necessary.

I was surprised at how little pastry my recipe (thank you Tamasin Day-Lewis's standard shortcrust) called for but it was the thinness which accounted for near perfection. What an amazingly simple but definately all-time great dessert. And how super to think of the original pudding being created accidentally by a pub cook in 1820. In my opinion the more recent tart adaptation to the former 'pudding' seems like an improvement. But I shall have to go to Bakewell to sample its secret recipe.

(N.B. a couple more reasons to go to Bakewell: 1) it's in the peak district. 2) Jane Austen supposedly stayed (actually in the Bakewell tart birthplace inn) there when writing some of Pride and Prejudice. Even if that's not true they still went to Derbyshire in the book.

Although I will occasionally go to Mr Kipling for Fondant french fancies, I'll be choosing my own Bakewell over a glace cherry-topped miniature from now on.