If you grew up anywhere other than my home county of Kent you might think that a 'Gypsy Tart' was a rather politically incorrect insult. Obviously I'm far to much of a left-leaning, Guardian-reader type for that- in fact it's a ridiculously sugar loaded bit of nostalgia in the form of a pudding which apparently originated in 'the garden of England'.
I can't remember the exact circumstances that led up to me dredging up the memory - I think it was something to do with custard tarts- but I was determined to introduce my sweet-toothed Northerner of a husband to this pud. There are several recipes on the internet (just be careful to put recipe after 'Gypsy Tart' in the search engine, or I wouldn't like to predict the results!)
The one I used was based on this one, although as I was making a roast dinner at the same time I cheated and used a ready-made pastry case. Apart from that it's really just muscavado sugar and a tin of evaporated milk. The recipe says to hand whisk for 15 minutes so I used my new/old Kenwood Chef until the motor started to smell hot, proabably about 10 minutes. I ended up with far more filling than could fit into the case, which probably saved us a trip to the dentist, because this is a seriously sweet treat.
