half cup not half stick aargh
November 28, 2024 7:17 AM   Subscribe

Urgent baking question: in this tart, will the curd filling fail if 4 tablespoons of butter are missing? If so, can I heat it up on the stove and add the butter?

I made the filling yesterday and I didn’t realize that I was using half a stick instead of half a cup of butter! Extremely basic mistake. I just realized this morning as I was making the crust—the tart is not baked yet. The filling certainly tastes nice, but would it be a runny disaster if I baked it as is? Could I reheat it gently and introduce more butter?
posted by Countess Elena to Food & Drink (6 answers total)
 
Response by poster: [posted a correction that was incorrect, sorry. Long morning already]
posted by Countess Elena at 7:18 AM on November 28


Best answer: I think it will be fine. More butter in the curd will make it silkier but I don’t think you’re at risk of it splitting in the oven as is. Since you have some of the fat - along with the eggs- your emulsion should be ok.

But if you don’t want to take a chance, just warm the existing curd up to 160-ish in a double boiler and whisk in the necessary butter (on or off heat).
posted by janell at 7:29 AM on November 28 [2 favorites]


Best answer: You can certainly reheat it and add the butter if you want (reheating a curd to thicken it more is a common technique), but if you are happy with the taste and consistency now, then it'll be fine baked. The butter is not essential for thickening.
posted by ssg at 7:40 AM on November 28 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: Great, thanks so much! A lifesaver again—
posted by Countess Elena at 7:41 AM on November 28


Just for posterity's sake: I completely forgot to add butter to the curd when baking that tart once (well, technically the NYT version that inspired that one) and it was actually even more delicious than the times I've made it correctly.
posted by dizziest at 6:22 PM on November 29 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: Forgot to update this—yes, the curd was delicious! So was the cinnamon cream and the crust. But the crust absolutely refused to budge from the plate. This is an issue to address separately, but it did no one any harm to have some messy plating.
posted by Countess Elena at 1:27 PM on December 2


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