Strawberry tarts topped with toffee strawberries

The toffee strawberries are the ultimate extra for my very fancy strawberry tarts. The crunchy toffee, sweet strawberry, soft cream and crumbly pastry will give you every sweet sensation all at once. They use caster sugar for the toffee in the kitchen at The Scottish Cafe & Restaurant, but Mummy uses granulated; either is fine.

Serves four to six (depending on the size of your pastry cases)

4-6 tsp home-made strawberry jam 4-6 tbsp double cream 12 strawberries, stalks attached 200g unsalted butter, at room temperature 250g caster sugar ½ tsp vanilla extract 250g plain flour, sieved, plus extra for dusting 90g cornflour

1 To make the pastry, beat the butter, 100g of sugar and vanilla together in a bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in the flour and cornflour. Transfer to a floured surface and knead together to make a firm dough. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

2 Remove from the fridge and allow to come to room temperature. Roll the

pastry out onto a floured surface and use a cutter to cut 4 to 6 circles about the thickness of a two-pound coin and large enough to fit your chosen pastry cases. Lay a circle in each pastry case and put the filled cases in a shallow muffin tray. Using a fork, prick a few holes in the pastry, then transfer the tray with the filled pastry cases to the freezer and chill for 30 minutes. This will help stop the pastry from shrinking.

3 Preheat the oven to 180C/gas Mark 4. Bake for 20 minutes until crisp and golden. Cool for a few minutes, then transfer to a wire cooling rack.

4 To assemble, whip the cream until it forms soft peaks. Place 1 tsp strawberry jam in the bottom of each pastry case, followed by a generous spoonful of the cream.

5 To make the toffee strawberries, place the remaining 150g of sugar in a heavy-based pan and bring to a simmer. You can move the pan to stop the sugar from sticking, but don’t stir it. Simmer until the sugar changes to a light golden toffee shade. This can take 10-15 minutes, but don’t take your eyes off the pan once you see the colour start to change, as it can do so very quickly and you’ll have ruined the toffee and your pan. Also, be super-careful as the pan and the toffee will get extremely hot.

6 Very carefully dip each of 12 strawberries into the toffee. If the strawberries have very long stalks, it makes it easier. Alternatively, pierce the top with a fork and use to dip the strawberry in the toffee. Allow any excess to drip off, then transfer to a sheet of greaseproof paper and leave to cool. This will only take a few minutes.