These are the ultimate Mini Strawberry tartlets with vanilla custard, also called Tarte aux Fraises in French. The mini tarts consist of a Pâte Sablée shortcrust pastry filled with silky vanilla custard (pastry cream), topped with a super easy whipped cream decoration and sweet, fresh strawberries. These Mini Strawberry tarts with custard are a beautiful harmony of of melt-in-your-mouth pastry, refreshing strawberries and creamy custard.

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📖 What is Tarte aux Fraises
This traditional French dessert is effectively a Strawberry Custard Tart that consists of a sweet shortcrust pastry crust that is filled with silky vanilla crème pâtissière and delicious fresh strawberries. Custard Strawberry tartlets are widely popular in France as well as in most European countries and can be easily found in most pastry shops and bakeries.
Unlike traditional American Strawberry Pie, the French version is typically made of buttery sweet shortcrust pastry as the tart base, and the filling involves some sort of cream, typically vanilla pastry cream underneath the strawberry filling. Some of the modern interpretations of the traditional Tarte aux Fraises are made in individual serving sizes, just like this Strawberry tartlet below from Pierre Herme and my Mini Strawberry tarts recipe.
💡What is a tartlet
A tart or tartlet is a freestanding, shallow, open-faced pastry consisting of a filling in a pastry case with an open-top, not covered with pastry. The pastry is usually a rich shortcrust pastry (Pate sable dough), while the filling can be both sweet or savory. A tart case is typically baked in a tart ring with fluted or straight sides. Smaller tarts are often referred to as tartlets. Lemon tart, fruit tart, chocolate tart, coffee tart, caramel tart...you name it!
Make sure you check out my Ultimate Pâte Sablée Guide (incl. video recipe) that explains everything about how to make sweet shortcrust including ingredients, technique, equipment, and even more.
🌟 Why this is the best Mini Strawberry Tartlet recipe
- It is rather easy – As fancy as it looks, making this Tarte aux Fraises recipe is rather easy, especially once you have the tart cases baked. The one part you need to pay attention to is making the tartlet shells, but I will teach you how to do it easily step-by-step
- It is super delicious – I never compromise on taste! Buttery pastry, silky vanilla custard, and sweet, refreshing strawberries make these fresh Strawberry Tartlets absolutely irresistible! It is creamy, fruity, and rich, but very well balanced in sweetness! You will love it!
- It is an honest, detailed tutorial – While this Mini Strawberry tarts recipe might look long, all the information I have written here, every tip and trick will help you achieve the perfect results without any issues on the way. Remember, baking is science, and every little detail written here is to help YOU!
📝 Ingredient notes
For the Pâte Sablée, sweet shortcrust
- Flour: I am using pastry flour (that is lower in protein content) for this French Strawberry tartlets recipe, feel free to use All-purpose flour, if you can't find pastry flour in your local supermarket. If you want to be a pro when it comes to deciding what type of flour to use in your baking, please read my flour guide
- Almond: Some Pâte Sablée recipes contain almonds, some don't, I prefer mine with almond flour from a taste and texture point of view. Pâte Sablée with almond flour is slightly crispier with some marzipan taste. It is worth buying good quality ground almonds, without skin. Alternatively, in case of nut allergy, replace it with an equal amount of pastry flour
- Sugar: This sweet shortcrust pastry is made with a small amount of powdered sugar that makes the mini tart case sweet but not overly sweet. If you want to learn about the different types of sugar and how to use them in baking, please read my sugar guide
- Salt: An essential ingredient in most dessert recipes. Balances flavor and enhances other ingredients. This is a sweet-tart dough and I just love that extra very mild salty kick at the end
- Butter: Use always unsalted as you want to be in control of the quantity of the salt. I am using high-quality 82% fat content European-style butter in all my recipes. While in most of the recipes butter needs to be at room temperature, this is an exception and you have to take it very seriously. The butter needs to be chilled, which means take the butter out of the fridge, cut it into cubes then place it in the freezer for 10-15 minutes before using it
- Egg: Room temperature as always. Please note that this is not a Vegan pâte sablée recipe and the egg can´t be left out or replaced unless you have the knowledge to totally reformulate the recipe
🛒 You’ll find detailed measurements for all Ingredients in the printable version of the Recipe Card at the bottom of this post
For the Vanilla custard (pastry cream)
- Milk: Use high-fat content milk, the highest you can get! It makes a huge difference when it comes to the deepness of the taste
- Sugar: Simple, white granulated sugar is perfectly fine
- Egg: Some pastry cream recipes call for whole egg however I strongly advise using egg yolk only for the best texture and flavor. Perhaps try my pavlova recipe if you want to use up your egg whites? Another, maybe not so obvious note is that the color of your egg yolk will dictate the color of your pastry cream. Farm eggs make super yellow pastry cream, on the other hand, supermarket eggs are usually way paler
- Flour: Flour is one of the thickening agents in this pastry cream recipe, use All-purpose flour. No, it won’t taste like flour!
- Starch: Corn starch is the other thickening agent in the recipe, theoretically you could only use flour OR only starch however I prefer 50%-50%.
- Vanilla: Vanilla is THE heart of making Strawberry tartles! Avoid using artificial vanilla. There are several great brands for fine, pure vanilla, I use Nielsen massey which I love and really recommend. I use vanilla bean paste instead of vanilla extract for my pastry cream for the deepest, most delicious vanilla cream
- Butter: Always use unsalted butter as you want to be in control of the quality of the salt. In my recipes, I always use 82% European-style butter. Room temperature is key here. If too cold, it won’t incorporate properly. If too hot/liquid, it will make the pastry cream runny
🛒 You’ll find detailed measurements for all Ingredients in the printable version of the Recipe Card at the bottom of this post
For the cream and strawberry topping
- Fresh strawberry: Use sweet fres strawberries you can access, and cut them into smaller pieces. Tip: Grab a few sheets of kitchen towel and gently soak some moisture out from the strawberries after you cut them. In this way, strawberries won´t make the cream underneath soggy and your Strawberry tartlets will look super professional
- Mascarpone: Very rich Italian cream cheese, exceptionally smooth, and easy to spread or whip. The flavor is milky and slightly sweet. Make sure you use high quality full-fat version, or you might not be able to whip it up
- Heavy cream: Also known as whipping cream, has a fat content of between 36% and 40%, the one I am using is 36%. Use it very cold and do not substitute with vegetable-based “whipping cream”
- Powdered sugar: You will need a small amount of powdered sugar to whip up the cream
🛒 You’ll find detailed measurements for all Ingredients in the printable version of the Recipe Card at the bottom of this post
👩🍳 How to make this recipe
1. The importance of temperature while making Pâte Sablée
When I started experimenting with baking, I had several disastrous attempts making Pate sablee. Now I understand that the one and the only reason I failed was being impatient and forcing the dough even when its temperature was inappropriate.
Baking is science and in general, the temperature is one of the most important factors to understand and utilize for our benefit. When I say temperature I don't purely mean baking temperature, but also the environment we work e.g kitchen temperature as well as the dough temperature.
While making the pate sable recipe, the temperature is everything! If the dough is too warm, it's sticky and can't be rolled out or shaped. If too cold, it will easily break. The entire pastry-making process is a balancing exercise between keeping the dough cold enough, but not too cold.
💡 Top Tip: To control the temperature of the dough don´t be shy to take it in and out of the freezer 10x or as many times it is required
2. Process of making the mini tartlet cases
The process of making Tart dough is not difficult, but a step-by-step process.
- Make sure all ingredients are measured with Digital scale and prepare all the tools ahead: Rolling pin, Silicone baking mat, Perforated “air” baking mat, Perforated tart ring
- Place the measured butter chunks into the freezer for 5-10 minutes
- Sift together dry ingredients; flour, icing sugar, salt, mix so they are combined properly
- Add very cold butter to dry ingredients and rub the mixture between your hands until it becomes a sand-like consistency. This will take about 3 minutes, make sure you do not spend too much time with this step as butter can easily warm-up and that is something we want to avoid
- Add egg into the mixture and mix with your hands just until the dough comes together. First, it might look crumbly but do not add more wet or dry ingredients to the recipe instead gently knead the dough with the palm of your hand for a minute or two (do not over-knead and do not use a mixer) just until the dough becomes smooth
- If the dough is too warm and sticky, place it in the fridge for 10-15 minutes first. Otherwise, continue with rolling the dough out into 2mm thickness between two Silicone baking mat. The recipe quantity is designed in a way that once you roll the dough out it will reach the silicone baking mat from edge to edge
- Place the dough into the freezer for 10-15 min in between the two Silicone baking mat. Do not remove the mat at this point as the dough might stick to the mat while it is warm and it would break the dough
- Prepare your oven rack with the Perforated “air” baking mat and Perforated tart rings on top
- Take the dough sheet out from the freezer, remove the top of the silicone mat, and using one of the Perforated tart rings, cut out 8 circles – this will be the bottom of your tart crust. Carefully move the dough circles with the help of an Offset spatula and place them into the rings one by one
- If at any point the dough gets too warm to work with, pop it back into the freezer for 5 minutes. You might need to make the dough in and out of the freezer a lot of times but that is fine, don´t try to force the dough while it is warm. It is extremely important to work with a dough that is cold enough to be able to handle (so not sticky) but not too cold which would result in breaking it
- Cut 8 long strips out of the dough, this will be the side of the tart
- Carefully place the strips into the ring one by one. Press each strip onto the side of the rings so it sticks to them. Again make sure you work with a dough that is cold enough but not frozen as that would make it impossible to place it into the tart ring without breaking it
- Place the Perforated tart ring with the pastry dough in them into the freezer for 1 hour
- Pre-heat oven to 160C / 320F (no fan)
- After 1 hour take the pastry dough with the rings on them out and trim them with a sharp knife
- Bake for 20 min then carefully remove the rings. Once you take the tarts out of the oven wait for a minute or two for the pastry to somewhat contract within the ring then you will be able to easily remove the rings. If the ring seems to be stuck onto your pastry it means probably you will need to bake it for a few more minutes
- Once tart rings are removed, bake the tartlets for another few minutes. The tarts will be ready baked already after a few minutes however if you wish to bake them until golden brown then bake them for another 10 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet if necessary
Make sure you read my Pate sablee tutorial for any further details and Troubleshooting. Please note that, unlike some other recipes state, no need for a food processor to make this recipe.
💡 Top Tip: Once you take the tarts out of the oven wait for a minute or two for the pastry to somewhat contract within the ring then you will be able to easily remove the rings. If the pastry seems to be stuck onto the ring, it means that you will need to bake it for a few more minutes. Do not force it as you can easily break it
3. How to make Vanilla custard filling
Pastry cream is the most delicious, rich, silky, and creamy custard-like cream filling used in many types of desserts. I have a whole detailed Baking Guide with tons of tips about making the perfect pastry cream (Creme Patissiere), make sure you read it.
- In a large enough bowl with the help of a Hand whisk, mix together sugar and egg yolk until slightly fluffy for about 1-2 minutes
- Mix in corn starch, flour, and vanilla until thoroughly incorporated and have a smooth paste
- Bring milk to boil in a saucepan on medium heat then remove it as soon as it starts simmering. Make sure it is simmering but not crazy boiling
- Pour the warm milk over the egg yolk mixture slowly while whisking vigorously with a Hand whisk. This stage is effectively tempering the egg yolks and the mixture should already start to slightly thicken
- Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook on medium heat for a few minutes until it thickens. Concretely it is approximately 1 min after the first boil. It might get lumpy first, don’t worry just keep whisking and the cream will get smooth and glossy
- If in doubt, strain the pastry cream for a lump-free, creamy end result
- Add in room temperature soft butter and mix with a Rubber spatula until completely incorporated. It is worth adding the butter in 3 stages and mixing well after each addition
Let the cream come to room temperature before assembling the Strawberry Tartlets. Place the cream into a shallow bowl or container and cover the entire surface with plastic wrap to avoid skin forming on top.
💡 Top Tip: It’s worth keeping a good quality (so that the milk won’t burn in it) small/medium-sized saucepan for making pastry cream and other creams for baking
4. How to make whipped cream
An easy, lightly whipped cream will be added to the Strawberry Tartlets. The whipped cream frosting is super simple, it consists of heavy cream, mascarpone, and a small amount of icing sugar whipped until fluffy, pipeable consistency.
Using the right ingredients at the right temperature is extremely important while making whipped mascarpone:
- mascarpone has to be cold, use the full-fat version (41%)
- heavy cream needs to be very cold (pop it into the freezer for a few minutes before using it) and again, full-fat version so anywhere between 36-40%
- icing sugar has to be sifted to avoid lumps
Move all 3 ingredients into a bowl and whip the mixture with an electric hand mixer for a minute or two until it reaches a creamy, fluffy consistency, then stop.
💡 Top Tip: I don´t use my stand mixer to whip this frosting since it is really easy to overwhip it. The mixture should be whipped only for a few minutes until fluffy. It won´t get stiffer after this point, in fact, if you overbeat it, it will get only runner, then it will break.
5. How to assemble
Once the tart cases are nicely chilled and pastry cream has set, it is time to assemble your Mini Strawberry tartlets!
- Fill the tart cases with the vanilla custard cream
- Pipe whipped cream on top all around, then press it down with a spoon
- Cut fresh strawberries into small pieces and arrange them on top of the whipped cream
- After strawberries are arranged decorate with basil or mint leaves and chopped pistachios
Voila, your Tarte aux Fraises are ready!
💡 Top Tip: Use a few paper kitchen towels and let them soak some juice out of the strawberries – this is necessary so the cream won´t get wet or soggy.
🥣 Equipment notes
You can achieve a neat, visually appealing, professional-looking tart crust by using professional baking equipment. Luckily these are available to purchase on Amazon not just for professionals, but also for home baker and will help your work enormously while making this Strawberry tart recipe.
Silicone baking mat
I recommend using 2 Silicone baking mat for rolling the pastry dough out in between them. The recipe is designed in a way that you do not need to add extra flour while rolling the dough however it might stick to your kitchen counter so use a silicone baking mat. It’s also possible to use 2 sheets of parchment paper however the silicone mat provides a much neater, smooth surface. While rolling, start from the center of the disc and work your way out in all directions.
Perforated Baking Mat
The Perforated “air” baking mat is perfect for making tart crust, éclairs, or even cookies. Thanks to the holes in the mat, the heat spreads evenly throughout mats’ surface guaranteeing a perfect and even baking without blind baking. The dough won´t puff up while baking the tarts and will be baked super neat.
While baking the tart shells, use the Perforated “air” baking mat straight on top of the oven rack (so not in a baking pan) so that the air can circulate properly.
Perforated Tart rings
The Perforated tart rings are non-stick and stainless, they allow homogeneous baking due to the even air circulation. Silikomart offers rings in various shapes and sizes, I am using an 8cm (3,14inch) diameter round version in this case, however, the recipe can be made in larger rings as well just like this Raspberry Frangipane tart.
Absolutely no need to grease the tart rings when making Pâte Sablée, the dough will stick to its perforated side while baking, and will contract after baked - so the ring can be removed easily.
❓Recipe FAQs
Yes, you can use traditional tart pan equipment but then you will have to blind bake the tart cases in a traditional way
Yes of course you can, this recipe works no matter what size or shape of tart you want to bake, however, you will need to adjust the ingredients accordingly
Yes, most probably you can, however, you can´t just replace flour with gluten-free flour 1:1 without reformulating the recipe. When one ingredient changes, some other ingredients need to be changed too in order to keep the balance in the texture and flavor
Probably you can, however just as making it gluten-free, you will need to adjust the ingredients somewhat if the egg is left out. Sadly, I am not able to provide substitutes for all sorts of allergies and diets and I do not have eggless ladyfinger and eggless pastry cream recipe
The flour, starch, and butter will make this pastry cream set, so if your cream is runny, very likely that your measurements for the "thickening" ingredients were inaccurate. Or, perhaps you did not cook the cream for long enough, or maybe your cream just needs a bit more time to set in the fridge
Once you assemble the tart, I suggest serving it shortly after, or, should be stored in the fridge. I suggest you cover the dessert to make sure it does not absorb any smell from the fridge. Leftover tart - if there is any - should be stored in the fridge for 1-2 days in an air-tight container.
You can easily freeze the tart cases before or after baking, however, do not freeze the fully assembled strawberry tartlets
✨ More Tart recipes
🍓 More Strawberry recipes
Make sure to also check out my Spring Desserts recipe collection!
Mini Strawberry Tartles (Tarte aux Fraises)
Equipment
Ingredients
Shortcrust pastry tart shell
- 90 g (¾ cups) Icing sugar
- 230 g (2 cups) Pastry flour AP works too
- 30 g (⅓ cups) Almond flour
- Pinch of salt
- 110 g (½ cups) Unsalted butter very cold cut into cubes
- 50 g Egg approx. 1 egg
Vanilla custard
- 500 g (2 cups) Whole milk
- 100 g (½ cups) Granulated sugar
- 80 g (⅓ cups) Egg yolk approx. yolk of 4-5 eggs
- 25 g (⅕ cups) Corn starch sifted
- 25 g (⅕) All purpose sifted
- 2 teaspoon Vanilla bean paste
- 50 g (⅕ cups) Unsalted butter soft, room temp
Whipped cream
- 200 g (¾ cups) Heavy Cream very cold, high fat min 36%
- 100 g (½ cups) Mascarpone cold, high fat
- 40 g (⅓ cups) Icing sugar sifted
Garnish
- Strawberry
- Chopped pistachio
US customary cup measurement is an indicative figure only. Measure the ingredients with a digital scale by weight (gram). Baking is art but also science which requires precision and accuracy.
Instructions
Sweet shortcrust pastry
- Sift together dry ingredients; flour, icing sugar, almond, salt
- Add very cold butter chunks and rub the mixture between your hands until it becomes a sand like consistency
- Add egg into the mixture and mix with your hands just until the dough comes together
- Knead with the palm of your hand for a minute or two (do not over knead and do not use mixer) just until the dough becomes smooth
- Take the dough out from the freezer, remove the top of the silicone mat and using one of the perforated tart rings, cut out 8 circles - this will be the bottom of your tart crust. Carefully move the dough circles with the help of an Offset spatula and place them into the rings one by one
- Cut 8 long stripes out of the dough, this will be the side of the tart
- Carefully place the stripes into the ring one by one. Press each stripe onto the ring so it sticks to it
- Pre-heat oven to 160C / 320F (no fan)
- After 1 hour take the pastry dough with the rings on them out and trim them with a sharp knife
Pastry cream
- Mix in corn starch, flour, and vanilla until thoroughly incorporated and have a smooth paste. If too thick, mix in a very small amount of milk
- Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook on medium heat for a few minutes until it thickens. Concretely it is approximately 1 min after the first boil. It might get lumpy first, don't worry just keep whisking and the cream will get smooth and glossy.
- If in doubt, strain the pastry cream for a lump free, creamy end result then add in soft butter in 3 steps mixing after each addition
- Place the cream into a shallow bowl and cover the entire surface with plastic wrap to avoid skin forming on top. Store in fridge, let it properly set for a few hours
Whipped cream
- Place all ingredients into a bowl and slowly start to whip then gradually increase speed. Stop as soon as mixture reaches pipeable consistency, do not over beat . Do not use a stand mixer as cream can easily be over whipped
Assemble
- Once tart shells are cooled and custard filling has set, fill each tart shells with pastry cream up until the edge of the tart shells then smooth the top with an offset spatula
- Pipe cream on top and make the pattern using a spatula or spoon
- Cut strawberries according to your liking then use a few paper kitchen towels and let them soak some juice out of the strawberries - this is necessary so the filling underneath won´t get wet or soggy
- Arrange the strawberries on top of the tart then chop some pistachios finely and sprinkle all around the strawberries
- Serve the Strawberry tarts soon after assembling
- Store in fridge
Lana
This is the 3rd tartlet I try from your website and I love all of them! This strawberry tartlet is a keeper, love how elegant and delicious it is without being overly sweet.
Jens
I recently made your strawberry tart recipe and the pastry creme was so delicious! I've been following your IG account and so enjoy seeing all the desserts you make!! TY for such detailed instructions!
Aeryn
I am so impressed with the focus on detail of the entire recipe!!! So so easy to follow, she makes everything so clear and makes sure nothing goes wrong 🥰 This tart was such a dream to make, thank you ❤️
Ginny Wadhwa
How u make sure that ur tart shells don’t get soft after putting pastry cream?
admin
Hey, you are supposed to serve these fresh, def within 24h. If the shells are well baked and the pastry cream is thick enough, the tart shell won´t get soft within this time frame.
Tiffany
Hi! I love the neat look of doing the the tart shell this way, but the last time I did it, with the two pieces of dough(base and strip around) it separated after baking. How can you prevent the shell from falling apart into two separate pieces?
Kata
Gently press the side down to the bottom so they touch each other already before baking they they will "bake together" in the oven:)
Rhista
I love the sweet combination 😍, I tried with kiwi instead, and same feels 🙈
Rhista
I love the sweet combination 😍.
Tried with kiwi . But still same feels 🙈🙈
Veronika
Excellent recipe!
Duncan Meyers
Bloody delicious 😁 5*
This one is definitely a showstopper for those summer nights entertaining