Cooking&Baking Challenge - Session 1 - Lime & Ginger Meringue Tart

This is my first post on the Cooking&Baking Challenge that I initiated this month. I don't know how successfull the Challenge is going to be, but I hope I will get more participants every month. This would be such a great way to learn more recipes, to see what others like cooking or baking, to exchange tips, not to forget to finally get to use cooking books that are just lying on the shelves!

So here is the recipe. I found it thanks to Pinterest! Ok, the point was to use my books, but well... I do love lime, I do love ginger, and I wanted to give the meringue a go... 

Lime and Ginger Meringue Tart

For the dough:

130gr of soft butter, 130gr of powder sugar, one egg and 300gr of flour.

In a bowl, mix the soft butter, the sugar and the egg. Add the flour little by little (I did it all at once without problem, and my butter was extremely soft) until you get a homogeneous ball of dough. Wrap it in cling film and leave it to rest one hour in the fridge.

Spread it and put it in a large baking form - or several small ones (I used a mid-sized form, the dough was a little too thick but that was nice still). Use a fork to prick the dough and put it back in the fridge for half an hour minimum.
Finally pre-heat the oven at 175°C and bake the dough for 20min after pricking it again so that it does not swell.

For the lime curd:

4 limes, 75gr of sugar, 2 tablespoons of cornflour, 3 yolks, 30gr of butter, 1 teaspoon of powder ginger and some green food colouring.

Get the juice and the zest of the four limes. Dilute the cornflour in 50ml of water. Heat up the juice, the peel, the cornflour and the sugar while constantly stirring. When it gets thicker (it does take a little while and then almost suddenly it gets a little slimy and gets almost transparent), take it off the heat and add the butter, the eggs, the ginger and the colouring (as much or as little as you wish).

Spread on the dough and put aside.

For the meringue:

3 egg whites and 150gr powder sugar. 

Beat up the eggs with the sugar and put over the lime curd (this is where I messed up and I still cannot figure out what went wrong after trying again a meringue two days later).

Put in the oven 180°C for about 15 minutes.

Serve warm or cold.

That's the recipe, now some random pictures of my work ;)

 

Like all recipes, it did have to be tested and tasted, here is my little one at "work". Both her and my husband really liked it. He liked it so much that he requested one to bring to work!

I found it so VERY sweet though! It was like almost 200% sugar in there ;) My favourite part was the lime curd. It was delicious! 

The one I made for my husband at work was great! Following the advice from my mum and some friends, I managed to make a great meringue!
Cold eggs, cold metal bowl, a pinch of salt, starting whisking medium speed then faster, once the eggs were stiff, I added the sugar slowly while whisking again at medium speed. It worked!!!! And also I baked it with the oven slightly open to let the humidity go out rather then stay in. 
Result: nice and crispy on top.
My mistake: close the oven over night leaving it inside, it is gone a little soft again.