Raspberry Crumble Tart with Speculoos

Yesterday it was 41⁰C. 41!!  It was sweltering hot and I loved it but then it made me absolutely dread winter. Sorry I couldn't help it, I had to bring up that horrid word. I'm not excited at all for my thick puffy coat, or having to scrape ice off my car, or those awful bitterly cold gusts of wind numbing my face. I'm only mildly excited to make butternut squash soup and wear cozy sweaters and leather boots. Please please please weather-people, make winter short and bearable this year. 

In an ode to summer, I made this tart. The recipe caught my eye right away, it seemed easy enough, no pastry dough required, the tart layer is the same as the crumble topping. I wanted to bake using summer fruits before they all disappear. I also tweaked the recipe just slightly to make it my own: I browned the butter before mixing it into the cookie base and spread a layer of Speculoos to compliment the tart base before adding the raspberries on top (I bet Nutella would be a delicious substitute/addition too). 

The tart comes together easily, the hardest part for me was evenly pressing the cookie base to the tart pan and ensuring the sides also had a good layer of dough. This takes a certain level of patience that I don't normally have, but I kept telling myself I wanted to make it look good, so I kept pressing on (pun intended).

The tart is a beautiful tart to look at and to eat. The browned butter really sings in the tart base, giving the whole thing a lovely caramelized flavour. The tart also has sandy texture from a mixture of brown and white sugars, reminiscent of a raw shortbread cookie. After I finished wolfing down my first slice of tart, I carefully cut pieces from the remaining tart sides to nibble on it...and then I kept picking at the crumble topping for a solid 5 minutes before I shamefully decided to stop. The cookie base was the perfect vehicle for the sweet raspberries. I'd reuse the tart base for another recipe, like a chocolate ganache or a lemon curd filling.

Also, as the recipe warned that this is best eaten within the first couple of hours after it's done. The tart bottom soaks up the raspberry juices, making it soggy. I ate it the next day, it wasn't so bad and tastes even better with some thick Greek yogurt. Mmm...summer!

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Recipe here!

Berry Berry Yogurt Pops

I once threw a fit (that's an understatement, it was equivalent to a tornado) because I couldn’t buy a blender. Really. True story. For months, I had been saving money to buy my first kitchen appliance. I went to bed thinking of creamy milkshakes, fruit juices, and icy cold smoothies, anything to beat the sticky summers in Shanghai.

My parents and I made plans to buy a Philips standing blender after our lunch on a weekend. I had safely tucked away my cash in my wallet, too excited to eat, I was bouncing off the walls, chirping, “Is it time yet? Can we go now?” Much to my chagrin, when we arrived at the house ware floor of the department store, the price for the blender had shot up. I didn't have enough money to buy it anymore. I was devastated. I went home sulking, banged the door shut, screamed into my pillow, yanked my blanket to the floor and cried in a corner (I don't think I even cried that hard about a Barbie. I mean, it was this just a blender). I suppose I'm a wee bit spoiled.


Weeks later, I had finally saved enough and bought the blender. I hugged it all the way home, admiring its mint green tint and the stand with a cantaloupe-colored dial for three speeds. There was also a small button for quick clean and an inner tube to stick in the middle of the blender for separating seeds. It was beautiful.

Immediately, I plugged the white cord into a socket, dolloped big scoops of vanilla ice cream into the blender, followed by chunks of banana and a dash of milk to make a milkshake. I concocted tall glasses of strawberry smoothies with ice and lounged on the couch with a book. Another time, I attempted to make kiwi juice, but it was grotesque, the blender contents turned a murky green color and I didn't separate the seeds, so the texture became grainy. The idea of making something from just the press of a button, how I could change and adjust the flavors and textures with just a few ingredients was incredibly fun for me. This blender became my best friend.

For Christmas last year, my parents bought me a small blender, knowing that I loved kitchen appliances (thankfully there were only cries of joy this time). It's similar to the magic bullet, but it goes by a different name, The Rocket. I didn't touch it much over the winter, I'd rather sip on tea and coffee to keep me warm. But recently, I've been blending smoothies every weekend to change up my breakfast routine.

So...I was going to tell you about a berry banana smoothie. Then I made these and thought who wants smoothies when you got popsicles?


Here are some berry berry yogurt pops, the perfect remedy to a heat wave. I didn’t follow a recipe, but went by instinct. I impatiently waited for them to freeze. I twiddled my thumbs. I oogled at food blogs from around the world. I ate some chocolate. Finally, hours later, I sunk my teeth into the frozen berry puree, but then the tartness of yogurt hit me--I forgot to add sugar to the yogurt. I adjusted the recipe and included sugar to even out the flavors and phew! it makes a huge difference.

I love the rosy pink color of blended raspberries. It's subtly sweet and you can play with other fruit too (melon or mangoes would be yummy). I’m looking forward to experimenting with other flavour combinations, like strawberry basil, or peach and ginger. Or even better, why not do as Matt Bittman suggests: cocktails on a stick?


There's really nothing better than cooling down in the sweltering heat with a few icy popsicles. Share this with your friends and I can promise you there won't be any tandrums.

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Recipe here!