Before moving on to making gluten-free shortcrust pastry, some essential tips that also apply to shortcrust pastry made with gluten flours.

-To avoid overheating the butter (especially lactose-free butter, which seems to be even more sensitive to the warmth of hands than traditional butter), all the utensils we will use, the eggs, and the butter must be refrigerated.

-To facilitate butter absorption, cut it into small cubes and refrigerate it until just before use.

-Since gluten-free shortcrust pastry, especially the one made without adding thickeners, lacks elasticity, it is necessary to place the final dough between two sheets of parchment paper, which will help us roll it to the desired thickness without problems and touch the dough as little as possible.

-Lastly, but not least, I suggest preparing the gluten-free shortcrust pastry 12 hours before baking it. In fact, I have noticed (since I don’t use ready-made mixes containing thickeners, but a homemade one) that after a 12-hour rest in the coldest part of the fridge, the shortcrust pastry is much more compact and manageable.

Now, let’s begin. Happy cooking.

Separate 3 yolks from their respective whites and set them aside.

Immediately sift together the rice flour and cornstarch (or corn starch as you prefer) and pour them into a cold steel bowl from the fridge.

Add the sugar, salt, and butter cubes, and quickly try to mix them together for a few moments, forming a kind of sandy, coarse, “crumbly” mixture.

Add the three yolks and, always quickly, try to incorporate them as much as possible into the butter and flour mixture. Only if we realize that it is impossible to incorporate all the flour, add a little egg white to the dough, because we know that eggs are not all the same.

It does not matter if the mixture is not smooth or if the butter cubes are mostly still visible; do not overheat the dough, especially the butter.

Immediately transfer the coarse dough onto a sheet of parchment paper.

Cover with another sheet of parchment paper and press a bit to form a sort of

rectangle or square about a finger thick, wrap it in plastic wrap (without removing the parchment paper), and store it immediately in the coldest part of the fridge for 12 hours.

Now we will prepare the gelatin that we will use to glaze both the pastry and the fresh fruit.

Pour the water into a small saucepan, add the lemon juice, sugar, starch (you can substitute it with equally mild-flavored rice starch), and finely grated washed lemon zest.

Thicken on the smallest burner over low heat (it will take about 10 minutes). Turn off and let cool. When we spread it on the tart and fresh fruit, it will be completely transparent and invisible.

After 12 hours, prepare the pan in which we will bake the shortcrust pastry in white, that is, without any filling.

Preheat the oven to 356°F

Take the shortcrust pastry out of the fridge, place it on the work table, remove the plastic wrap, and quickly roll it with a rolling pin to a thickness of about 1/4 inch with a diameter suitable for the pan.

Place it in the 11-inch tart pan, level it, and trim the edges gently, always without removing the parchment paper that covers it.

Place the weight on the surface of the shortcrust pastry and immediately in the hot oven at mid-height.

Be careful with the temperature and cooking time, as these gluten-free flours cook a little faster and also tend to burn a little faster.

After about 20 minutes, remove the pan from the oven, and very gently remove the weight and parchment paper from the surface.

If you notice that the shortcrust pastry tends to break, leave the parchment paper on the surface (without the beans or chickpeas) and put it back in the oven. We will think later about browning it a little on the surface under the grill without the paper on the surface. I did it to brown only the surface edges a little, to give some contrast to the green of the kiwis.

Finish baking, turn off the oven, and immediately take it out of the oven.

After 10 minutes, we will try to remove the paper from the surface, only if we were not able to do so earlier.

Let it sit for another hour before gently removing it from the pan. Gluten-free shortcrust pastry does not necessarily have to be amber-colored but, in general, remains a bit lighter than traditional ones.

After an hour, remove it from the pan and place it on the serving plate. When it is completely cold, we can start preparing the fresh fruit.

Brush the tart with a little lemon gelatin, using a brush, gently.

First, peel the kiwis. Slice them and start placing them on the tart as in the photo or according to your taste (depending on their size, it may not be necessary to use them all)

Peel and slice one banana at a time (again, it may not be necessary to use both), moisten the slices with a little orange juice to prevent them from oxidizing, and finally place them inside the tart.

Brush the fruit with the gelatin (which will not only glaze it but also further protect it from oxidation upon contact with air), place the tart in a cake carrier, and leave it at room temperature if it’s not too hot or in the fridge, remembering that the shortcrust pastry will absorb some of the moisture released by the fruit, becoming softer the next day.

Extra idea. You can accompany the tart portions with fresh whipped cream, or an orange cream, mandarin cream, sweet mandarin sauce, lemon cream, chocolate cream, and many other sweet preparations that you can find in the blog, using the search magnifying glass.

Bon appetit