Planning a Tea
My friend Deb and I are planning a tea later this month and preparations are in full swing. She loves all things Victorian so her house is perfect for this event. Charming vignettes are everywhere you look and she's created the atmosphere for a fantasy tea. Getting the girls together is the excuse for her to decorate and for me to help with the cooking. 
This week we got together to play with some recipes for the gathering.A recipe for key lime pie in Bon Appetit and another one for key lime bars in Cook's Illustrated made me think that key lime tartlets would be a perfect addition to the tea. Since these were both new recipes, and I was fiddling with the presentation I definitely needed to test the tart version. The Bon Appetit version was a traditional rendition with a graham cracker crust while the Cook's test kitchen arrived at a version with a touch of cream cheese and an animal cracker crust.
First we worked on the cream cheese version. We chitted and chatted and patted the crust in a variety of tartlet pans. It was only after the filling had been added that we realized... um you're supposed to like bake the crust first! Ooops. Staring at them didn't seem to change anything so we went ahead and baked them. To our surprise the crusts held together and tasted fine, maybe not as crispy as it would've been otherwise but definitely presentable.
Here's the Cook's Illustrated recipe we used:
Key Lime Bars
Crust
5 ounces animal crackers (vanilla wafers were cheaper)
5 tablespoons packed brown sugar
Pinch table salt
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
Filling
2 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1 tablespoon grated lime zest
Pinch table salt
1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk
1 large egg yolk
1/2 cup Key lime or regular lime juice
Garnish (optional)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and adjust oven rack to middle position.
Line 8x8 inch baking pan with tin foil, leaving overhang that can be used as handles to lift the bars from the pan. Spray foil with non-stick spray. Pulse animal crackers in a food processor until finely crumbled. Add sugar and salt and pulse. Add butter and pulse until combined. Press crumbs firmly into bottom of baking pan. Bake until golden, 18-20 minutes. Cool.
Stir cream cheese, lime zest, and salt in a bowl until softened and combined. Add sweetened condensed milk and whisk until incorporated and lumps are gone. Whisk in egg yolk. Gently whisk in lime juice.
Poor filling into crust and smooth surface. Bake 15-20 minutes or until set and edges start to pull away slightly from the sides of the pan. Cool 1-1 ½ hours. Cover with foil and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
Loosen edges and lift bars from the pan. Cut into squares and garnish with toasted coconut.
The Bon Appetit Key Lime Pie recipe is a more traditional version that uses graham crackers and is a bit more tart. It's a matter of taste as to which you prefer. Here's the key lime pie part of the recipe we tested.
Crust1 1/4 cups graham cracker crumbs
3 tablespoons sugar
Pinch of salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
Filling
1 14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk
4 large egg yolks
1/2 cup fresh Key lime juice or regular lime juice
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine cracker crumbs, sugar and salt in medium bowl. Add butter and stir until crumbs are moist. Press mixture onto bottom and up sides of a 9 inch pie dish. Bake crust until set and lightly browned, about 10 minutes. Cool Crust completely.
For filling whisk sweetened condensed milk and egg yolks in medium bowl to blend. Add lime jice and whisk until blended. Pour filling into cooled crust. Bake pie until filling is set. about 18 minutes. Transfer to rack and cool to room temperature. Cover and refrigerate pie overnight.
My coworkers were my guinea pigs and taste tested both versions. I served both versions with a dollop of whipped cream and some toasted coconut. The voting was 80% for the cream cheese version and 20% for the classic recipe. Deb and I both liked the tangier taste of the Bon Appetit filling but We liked the vanilla crust in the other tarts.
