Rhubarb, strawberry and almond tart (vegan)

’Tis the season to eat rhubarb. I love rhubarb. So much that last time I went to visit my parents in Italy I packed some rhubarb to bring there, as in Italy it’s not as easy to find and I couldn’t deprive my parents of its amazing taste.

I developed this recipe inspired by one of my all time favorite cake recipes I found in Sweet by Yotam Ottolenghi and Helen Goh, one of my most cherished cookbooks. I baked that cake (a soft fluffy sponge, a fruity centre and a crumble on top featuring some salt) so many times. And I baked it the last time I managed to visit my family ❤️🥺, and they loved it.

Now I wanted to tribute that recipe with my own spin on this lovely pairing and I created a vegan layered tart, but I kept the idea of having a crunchy layer in and the fruit layer from that recipe.

This tart is composed of:

– Sweet shortcrust pastry with almond flour and ground sesame seeds
– Almond sponge cake
– Rhubarb and raspberry layer
– Almond crumble layer
– Strawberry chocolate ganache (with home made vegan white chocolate)
– Macarons (almond) with rhubarb icing
– Fresh berries

Ingredients and procedure:

Sweet shortcrust pastry

240g flour

120g vegan butter

30g almond flour

80g icing sugar

30g water

Add the cold cubed butter to the flour and break it down into pieces, add the icing sugar and the almond flour and work quickly before adding the water. Quickly shape it handling the dough the least you can and flatten into a disc – cover with cling film and let rest in the fridge for at least 1h.

Blind bake at a preheated 160C fan oven 10’ (with the beans) + 5 (without the beans) .

(I prepare the fruit mix and the crumble mix at the same time, as they have to be added together in the tart case before finishing baking, the sponge mix is the last thing I prepare after these two)

Rhubarb and strawberry layer

150g rhubarb – cut 1cm

150g strawberries – cut 0.5 cm

15g brown sugar

15g cornflour

1 tsp lemon juice

1/2 vanilla

Pinch of salt

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and set aside.

Crumble layer

60g vegan butter

70g brown sugar

40g almond flour

50g flour

15g chopped almonds

1/4 tsp salt

Combine the ingredients together, except for the almonds, breaking the butter in chunks and working to have a breadcrumb like texture. Once you have breadcrumbs, add the chopped almonds, and set aside.

Almond soft sponge

50g self raising flour

50g sugar

15g almond flour

1/3 tsp baking powder

25ml oil

70ml almond milk

1 tsp vinegar

1/2tsp vanilla bean paste

Add the vinegar to the almond milk and let sit – this is the buttermilk.

In a large bowl, sieve together the flours, sugar and baking powder. Add the oil and the vanilla to the buttercream and start incorporating the wet mixture in the dry mixture, in batches. Quickly combine with a balloon whisk and use a spatula in the end to check there are no deposits at the bottom of the bowl. Pour the cake mixture in the tart shell, making sure that you have room for the fruit layer, the crumble and the ganache, so it has to be a thin layer- I usually pour 1cm of cake batter.

Scatter the fruit layer on the batter and cover with the crumble. Bake at 160C fan for ~35’.

Let cool well otherwise the crumble will not be as crunchy once covered with the ganache.

Strawberry ganache

150 g vegan white chocolate

155 g unsweetened almond milk

15 g agave syrup

15 g glucose syrup

12 ml lemon juice

20 g soft butter, to room temperature (20-25°C)

20g strawberry powder

Melt the vegan white chocolate at 45C in the microwave or with a double boiler system.

Heat together the almond milk with the agave and the glucose syrup – do not bring to a boil. Pour the warm milk mix over the chocolate in three times making sure that it’s glossy and well combined. Add the lemon juice and stir.

Pour the ganache into a blending glass and add the strawberry powder and soft butter, then emulsify with a blender.

Pour on the cooled tart and let rest in the fridge for 1h before decorating. I used macarons with a rhubarb buttercream filling and fresh fruit, but how to decorate is up to you!

Enjoy 🙂