Yorkshire curd tart: a well-kept, delicious secret

There are many old dishes in the UK that are hyper-regional, whose reach has never extended beyond geographical boundaries but remain much loved where they originated. Yorkshire curd tart is a good example: it is barely known beyond God’s own county (or God’s own four counties, which now technically make up what we think of as Yorkshire). There is no good reason for this – Yorkshire curd tart is just a delicious well-kept secret.

It was traditionally baked for Whitsun, or Pentecost, the day the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus’s disciples. Curd tart is literally a moveable feast, as its date depends on that of Easter itself. It may look like (and is sometimes wrongly characterised as) a custard tart, but it’s really a cheesecake baked in pastry. This makes sense when you realise that the ‘curds’ in its name are Little Miss Muffet-style curds, as opposed to lemon curd.

Curds are what are produced when you split whole milk with enzymes or acid. When these are added to hot milk, the milk will almost immediately solidify and then, when agitated, separate into waves of pale cheese curd and highlighter-yellow whey. Strained through a muslin cloth, the curds will set into something that looks like a firm ricotta, and will form the base of your tart filling. You can make your own curds with either rennet or lemon juice; my recipe is for lemon juice as it’s more easily available, and it’s vegetarian, but both will result in the same fresh, mild cheese curds.

The curd cheesecake sits on the most basic of shortcrust pastries, which is crisp and short, but also unassuming. It is quite simply the vehicle for the curd filling. It’s dotted with currants and it’s the dried fruit that brings sweetness to an otherwise not terribly sweet pudding.