Dessert can feel a little bit daunting–especially if you doubt your baking skills. But this easy fruit tart with berries and mascarpone sounds fancy, but takes hardly any effort and only a few simple ingredients to pull off.
Okay let’s admit it–it’s fun to pull out something that looks a little over the top at a company pot luck or family meal. Everyone’s sure that 1) you didn’t make it and you’re faking or 2) you are officially the most awesome person ever to have existed. I like number 2 best.
But if you’re more likely to be blamed for pulling a Sarah Lee switcheroo, let me assure you–even if you haven’t ever baked before you CAN pull this easy fruit tart with berries and mascarpone off. I know everyone says that, but this time I mean it.
First, keep in mind that I used a tart pan here. They have a round removable bottom and those wavy edges.
You can buy a tart pan if you want to, but if you don’t have one, you can use a round 9″ cake pan or even a pie plate will work. Your crust may fall a bit when it bakes (as in slide down inside the pan, but if you don’t care about that just go with it. It’s gonna taste the same).
And a store bought pie crust is the go-to shortcut we MUST have here. You’ll need to blind bake the crust before you fill it with our cheater pants (but still tastes awesome) filling. If you’ve never blind baked, check out this post on how to do it.
Basically you just need to bake the crust unfilled and unless you want the middle to puff up like a hot air balloon, you have to blind bake it. You’ll get it. 🙂
In this particular easy fruit tart with berries and mascarpone recipe I was so excited to find Jell-O’s Simply Good Vanilla Bean instant pudding which (thankfully) is free from artificial colors and some of the fakey-stuff we don’t need. I used that here and it was good but doggone it–sometimes I like artificial flavoring as much as the next guy.
If you’d like a little more creamy-cheesy dessert ideas, check out my Tiramisu with Pound Cake, or the best doggone Raspberry Cheesecake in existence.
Easy fruit tart with berries and mascarpone
Ingredients
- 1 refrigerated pie crust
- 1 3.4 ounce package instant vanilla pudding
- 2 cups cold milk
- 4 ounces mascarpone cheese (about 1/2 cup)
- 1/4 cup powdered sugar
- assorted berries of your choice I used blackberries, raspberries, blueberries and strawberries
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400. Press the pie crust into the tart pan, making sure it's tucked well in to all the corners and against the edge of the pan.
- Lay a large sheet of aluminum foil or parchment paper over the surface of the piece crust and fill the center with dried beans, rice or pie weights.
- Bake until the edges of the pie crust are just golden--about 18-25 minutes. Remove from the oven and lift out the foil with the dried beans/rice/weights inside and set aside. Be careful they're hot!
- Set the crust aside and allow it to cool slightly while you make the filling.
- In a medium bowl, add the pudding mix, milk, mascarpone, and powdered sugar. Beat with a hand mixer or with a spoon until the pudding is starting to set and all the ingredients are incorporated. About 5 minutes.
- Pour the filling (as much as will fit) into the crust within about 1/4" of the top of the crust. Cover the pudding by laying a piece of plastic wrap directly on the pudding to keep it from forming a skin.
- Refrigerate 8 hours or overnight.
- Once the tart is chilled, add the berries by piling them on one side of the tart. Sprinkle with the lemon zest, slice and serve.
Notes
Nutrition
Tornadough Alli is not a nutritionist or dietitian, and any nutritional information shared is an estimate. If calorie count and nutritional value is important to you, we recommend running the ingredients through whichever online nutritional calculator you prefer. Calories and values can vary depending on which brands were used.
Leave a Reply