Why you saucy tart...

When I was younger, still living in Asia, my family had a tradition of enjoying strawberry tarts for dessert on Christmas Eve. We discovered these particular tarts at a local French Bakery (the same bakery that introduced me to one of my favorite drinks of all time, the Diabolo). They made other varieties but our favorite one was the strawberry tart. They were about the size of a tea cup saucer and they were heaven...especially in a place where such a thing is next to impossible to find else where. You definitely learn to appreciate the little things when very little is available. You'd be amazed at how much you'd be willing to spend for a jar of green olives...
Strawberry tarts were not always our Christmas Eve dessert of choice. I remember often having a sort of fruit jello salad type thing. But as soon as the tarts were discovered, we had to have them and they quickly found a home in our Christmas Eve menu of randomocity. (Come for Christmas Eve sometime...you will understand.)
I have craved those tarts for years since moving away. No tart has compared since that French Bakery and we no longer seek out strawberry tarts at Christmas time because they just don't measure up. Until today.
Tomorrow, the squadron is having a picnic at a local park. There will be a dessert contest and I decided I wanted to try to make a strawberry tart. All by myself. A larger pie sized one at that...to share. I spent most of the afternoon working on the crust, the creme, cutting the strawberries, baking the crust, making the glaze, etc. etc. It wasn't entirely tedious. In fact, I'm SO happy I chose the recipe I did because it DID have you make your own crust and ingredients and as I've mentioned before, I'm a strong believer in making things from scratch.
It paid off. I am in love with this tart. After being easily persuaded to have a piece for dessert tonight (I ended up making TWO tarts) to make sure it is acceptable for human consumption, I cut into the creamy goodness and took my first bite. Christmas Eve in China with French Bakery strawberry tarts memory flash back all over again. It's perfect. No. It's better than perfect. It's identical. I'm SO happy and I won't be letting this little sucker slip out of my grip now that I have found it. Yay is for yummy!
In other news:
I lost 2 pounds!
I started reading a new book that I will write about later!
I went to student orientation and nobody laughed at me!
I like donuts!
The end.

Photo: Across the Universe found via Handle With Care