Recipe: Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free Blueberry & Chia Seed Christmas Tart

French-born New Zealander Carine Claudepierre shares a  dairy-free, gluten-free version of a classic Alsace Christmas recipe. 

Recipe by Carine Claudepierre

First published in Clean Bakery: Wholesome & Nourishing baking for New Zealanders.

This recipe revisits the traditional Austrian Linzertorte — a very popular Christmas dessert in the French Alsace region where I come from. The usual recipe uses lots of nuts, typically hazelnuts or almonds, as a crust and lots of sugar to create a crispy crust with a sweet jam filling. This recipe is a low-carb version of the classic Linzertorte, made with a crispy nut and coconut flour crust filled with a moist blueberry-chia seed filling that resembles the jam usually used in this recipe.

Serves 6-8

INGREDIENTS

Pastry
110 g almond meal (1 cup)
110 g ground hazelnuts (1 cup)
6 tablespoons coconut flour (plus extra
to decorate, if desired)
1 egg
4 tablespoons brown rice malt syrup or
liquid sweetener of your choice
60 ml liquid coconut oil (¼ cup)

Blueberry-chia seed filling
45 g chia seeds (¹⁄³ cup) plus
4 tablespoons lukewarm water to soak
375 g blueberries, fresh or frozen
(3 cups)
4 tablespoons stevia powder or
8 tablespoons maple syrup or
liquid sweetener of your choice

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 180°C, fan-forced. Grease a 23 cm round pie dish, or loose-bottomed tart tin, with coconut oil or butter. Set aside.

In a food processor with the ‘S’ blade attachment, combine the almond meal, ground hazelnuts and coconut flour. Then add the egg, brown rice malt syrup and coconut oil. Process on medium speed for about 1 minute or until the mixture comes together and forms a ball.

Transfer the dough to a bench or surface covered with a piece of cling wrap. Set aside a quarter of the dough to use for decorating the top of the tart or to serve as biscuits with the tart on the side.

Place another piece of cling wrap on the top of the remaining dough and start rolling the dough as you would for a regular pie crust. The cling wrap will prevent the dough from sticking to the rolling pin and the bench, so do not remove the layers until fully rolled.

Roll to fit the size of the pie dish. Remove the top layer of cling wrap and flip the crust over onto the greased pie dish. The dough will be very crumbly but workable. If it breaks simply use your fingers to shape and push the dough until it fits the dish perfectly. Chill in the refrigerator (to prevent the pastry shrinking when baked), while you make the filling.

To make the filling, put the chia seeds into a small bowl and add the lukewarm water. Give them a good stir and set aside for 2 minutes until they absorb the water. Give them a quick stir from time to time to stop them sticking together.

Meanwhile, place the blueberries and stevia powder in a saucepan, cover and warm over medium heat. When bubbles start to form on the side of the saucepan, uncover and stir in the soaked chia seeds. Simmer for 4–8 minutes or until the blueberries are cooked and it becomes jelly-like. If it is too liquid, which may happen if you are using a liquid sweetener, keep simmering until it thickens much like a jam does. Gently stir to prevent the chia seeds clumping together.

Remove from heat and transfer to a bowl. Cool for 10 minutes to let any extra moisture evaporate.

Meanwhile, prepare some pastry stars to decorate the top of the tart. If you end up with too many, they can be baked separately and served as cookies with the tart or to decorate the Christmas table. Roll the extra pastry dough between two pieces of cling wrap, as before, until it is the right thickness. Cut into stars using a cookie cutter. Place the stars on a baking tray covered with baking paper and bake for 10–12 minutes until golden brown. Cool on a wire rack.

Pour the blueberry chia seed filling into the pastry crust, and bake for 25–35 minutes or until the sides are golden brown. Cool completely, for about 1½ hours, before you unmould the tart. This will stop the crust from falling apart as it will harden while cooling down, getting very crispy and easier to unmould.

Sprinkle the baked stars with extra coconut flour to decorate, if desired.

Store at room temperature for up to 2 days.

Tip Replace the blueberries with raspberries or other berries of your choice.

This recipe was first published in Clean Bakery:Wholesome and nourishing baking for New Zealanders by Carine Claudepierre $49.99, Bateman publishing order online here

Carine was born and raised in France. When diagnosed with prediabetes she had to give up the pleasures of home-baking. But using her skills as a research scientist she started to develop innovative baking recipes that worked with her low-carb diet and her food blog started to attract hundreds of thousands of readers. Find her on sweetashoney.co.nz