How to make old-fashioned British macaroon jam tarts with a moist almond filling. Not to be confused with the Parisian macaron or the coconut macaroon. More links and recipes to the others below.

Old-Fashioned British Jam Tarts

What is a Macaroon Jam Tart? The other day, I re-discovered an old faithful British baking guide during a crazy New Year's it's-about-time-I-tidied-that-mess-up moment. Out fell a dusty 40th edition Be-Ro Flour Home Recipes book which Mum had handed me in 1992 before I left for France, a Scottish reminder to make the odd scone or shortbread now and again.

These old-fashioned British jam tarts basically jam tartlets filled with an almond cream. If you've ever tasted them in Britain, you'll immediately be whisked back in time. Our Scottish bakeries sold them as individual tarts and they included a hidden dollop of raspberry jam.

They had the same taste as a Bakewell Tart - except they were always served as tartlets. My thoughts also turned to Mr Kipling: we all knew from his evocative croaky but sexy-voiced UK adverts that he "makes exceedingly good cakes".

open recipe book for British macaroons as rolling pastry for them

What is a Macaroon vs Macaron?

Since these childhood macaroon memories in the UK, who would have dreamed I'd have married a Frenchman with a sexy accent and moved to Paris. The British macaroon was not the same as in France.

I say maca-ron, since these days there's still some confusion between the macaron and macaroon. What's the difference? Basically:

the French macaron is made with ground almonds, sugar and egg whites;
the coconut macaroon (rocher coco in French) is made with coconut, sugar and egg whites;
the British Macaroon is yet something else completely different. Let me explain below.

What is a British Macaroon?

So, after the French macarons and coconut macaroons, how come there is yet another British version? In fact there are two kinds of macaroons in the UK:

In Scotland, there is the popular Scottish macaroon bar. It has a very sweet fondant centre of mainly icing sugar mixed with a little potato, then rolled in chocolate and toasted coconut;
See my recipe for Scottish macaroon bar snowballs;
Then there are these macaroon jam tarts. I have no idea, however, why they are called macaroon. I can only assume that they contain an almond filling but that is all that gives it any relation to a macaron or macaroon, as the word originally comes from the Italian word for paste, referring to the almond, maccarone.

For much more, read my first chapter in my book, 'Mad About Macarons'
and in my article, Macaron vs Macaroon: What's the Difference?

How to Make Old-Fashioned British Macaroon Jam Tarts

So I took the basic short pastry recipe here from the Be-Ro flour book. It's the most basic and simple form of pastry and is insanely easy to work with.

What's more, there's no real need (or knead - pun groan please!) to leave the dough to rest in the fridge before baking with it. Use this pastry, for example, to make mince pies with this quick no-suet mincemeat recipe.

What I like about this basic short pastry recipe is that the crosses added on top of each tart are simply made by cutting thin strips out of the leftover pastry. So there is no waste!

Basic Short Pastry Recipe for Macaroon Jam Tarts

rubbing butter into flour to make a dough then rolling it out and cutting shapes

Rub the butter into the flour, salt and vanilla powder until breadcrumbs.
Add cold water to form into a dough then roll out thinly.
Cut out 9-10 7cm circles (or circles slightly bigger than the size of the tartlet cavities).
Press the dough into the pattie/tartlet or muffin tins.

step by step images pressing dough into tartlet trays, cutting thin strips from leftover pastry to make crosses on top of jam and almond filling

Mix together the ground almonds, sugar, almond extract and egg to a paste.
Add a teaspoon of your favourite jam in each then top with the almond mix.
No wastage with leftover pastry: cut thin strips for crosses and place on top of the jam and almond filling