I wanted one fresh and fancy treat this week, and boy did I deliver it for myself. In all honesty, the entire thing is improvised. I'm feeling pretty darn proud of myself.

These are grapefruit curd tarts. As in, like lemon curd but with fresh grapefruit juice, in little tart shells that I've never made before. It really came together.

Planning!

I thought long and hard as I planned this dish. I found this guide for curd to assuage my fears about the potential bitterness of the grapefruit juice. I calculated how much pastry dough I would need for the tart shells vs how much of a caloric hit I wanted from these snacks. I determined it would be best to make half of a basic single crust pate brisee, to be divided into six tarts. From there, I figured out that they had better be the size of a muffin base rather than a 5" tart pan (I have those, too), and that choice determined how much curd I would make: one basic recipe from the guide.

I did raise my eyebrow over the whole egg in the curd guide, because whites cook faster than yolks so I generally only make curd with yolks. But I was such a nervous nelly that I followed it exactly (except for the zest, because I was SO nervous about bitterness), and it actually worked out great! A little loose going into the fridge, but curd does tend to set up in the cold, so fingers crossed!

Here's the nutritional breakdown from Fitbit...

Groceries I had on hand...

• flour
• butter
• sugar
• salt
• eggs

Groceries I had to buy...

• grapefruit ($1.99)

Total monies spent for the entire recipe: $1.99

Total monies spent for each of these 6 snacks....

$.33 per snack...

Cooking!

First I made the tart shells. I prepped a half-recipe of basic single crust pate brisee, then weighed and rolled it out in sixths, pressing each into a muffin mold that I had sprayed with cooking spray. These chilled in the muffin tin in the fridge for another hour, then I pricked them all over with a fork and baked them up: 19 minutes at 375F. I cooled them in the tin for about 10 minutes, then pulled them out of the tin onto a wire rack and let them cook completely. They were so cute!

Then, the curd. This was a huge grapefruit that I ran through my juicer. Just the one grapefruit gave me over a cup of juice! I reduced it down to 3/4 cup of juice, cooled it, then stirred in the egg, egg yolk, and sugar, cooked that up to 180F, strained it, then stirred in a little salt and the butter. I cooled it in the fridge for about half an hour, then poured it into the tart shells to cool completely in the fridge.

Yes, I ate the little bit of leftover curd right out of the bowl with a spoon. Wouldn't you?

Treats accomplished!