Strawberry almond torte
Difficulty : 
It’s my friend’s Birthday, and I was in cooking mood, apart from the flattened chicken I cooked, I also whisked up a nice little dessert for the occasion. I went to the local market and the strawberry is so fresh at only $6 for 3 punnets, so I bought six and decided to make a Strawberry almond torte with lemon zest vanilla mascarpone.
You can never have too much of strawberries, these that I bought are seriously mega huge! That’s why I decided to use the smaller ones in the centre of the torte, and for the bigger ones, I cut them in half and put them on outer layer. And believe it or not, I made this torte totally by manpower – whisked by hand, and grounded the almond by hand! It is not that I am a perfect food preparation nazi, simply because I do not own a food processor nor a mixer. It would be my dream to own a Kitchen Aid (Artisan series, color Ice blue please…) But I simply do not bake enough to deserve one. So, the almond crust still has some crunchy bits in it, which is kind of nice.
This dessert is mainly strawberries, gotta be healthy right?? Well, that’s what I keep telling myself anyway.
Read on for recipes.
Ingredients
Crust
1. 75g butter softened
2. 40g caster sugar
3. 1 tsp grated lemon zest
4. ½ tsp natural vanilla extract
5. 1 egg
6. 1 egg yolk
7. 75g ground almonds
8. 1½ tbsp plain (all-purpose) flour
Filling
1. 250g mascarpone cheese, softened
2. 2 tsp caster sugar
3. 1 vanilla pod
4. ½ tsp natural vanilla extract
5. 1 whole grated lemon zest
6. 500g (2 punnets) strawberries, hulled (smaller size preferable)
7. small mint leaves, to garnish (optional)
8. half tangelo juice for glazing
9. grated tangelo zest, to garnish (optional)
10. 4 tbsp white sugar
Method
1. preheat oven to 180 degree Celcius, grease a 9inch springform cake tin.
2. beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy using electric beater (or by hand like me)
3. add vanilla extract, lemon zest, egg and egg yolk and mix until combined.
4. Fold in the ground almonds and flour.
5. spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and level the top with the back of a spoon.
6. bake for 15-20 minutes, until set.
7. Allow to cool in the tin, then remove from the tin and transfer to a cake rack or plate to cool completely.
8. remove the seeds from the vanilla pod
9. Mix the mascarpone, sugar, lemon zest, vanilla seeds, vanilla extract together until smooth.
10. spread the mascarpone mixture over the top of the cake.
11. from the centre, top with strawberries.
12. scatter the mint leaves and tangelo zest around
13. put the tangelo juice and sugar into a small saucepan.
14. heat gently until boiling point and sugar completed melted.
15. let it cool down and thicken
16. brush lightly over the strawberries and leave for the glaze to cool before serving
A Table For Two (ATFT) is Billy Law's food blog that features best eats in Sydney and around the world with drool-worthy food photography to salivate your appetite. I also throw in a smidgen of my food and travel photography for good measure. Billy Law also happened to be a contestant on MasterChef Australia 2011. 
This torte looks utterly gorgeous, I’m amazed that you ground your own almonds!! And is that a Split Enz song I spy in your title?
Looks yummy! (I found your recipe on Food Gawker.) You mention you want a mixer…. check out this website: http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/ This is one of my favorite cooking blogs, and she happens to like giving things away. TODAY, it happens to be 3 Kitchenaid mixers. You should definitely enter! Enjoy.
Just lovely; gorgeous, gorgeous styling and photo (love the font choice), and the torte looks delicious. Mascarpone would be a great tangy counterpoint to luscious fruit. Thanks for sharing.
Laura: HAHA! Yep, I just keep banging them over a towel with a rolling pin. IT was well worth the effort. I love that song!
Heather: Thanks for the heads up Heather! Wow, who would be so kind to givaway 3, and not 1 kitchenaid!!! I left a comment, and it was up to 18000 comments! Very unlikely will one
Tara: Thank you for dropping by. At first I am not sure the red background will clash with the red strawberries, fortunately it still works out well.
What a beautiful tart – and doubly impressive that it is all done by hand. Hope you get your kitchenaid!
Red is one of my favorite colors! This looks absolutely gorgeous!
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