It is a cloudy, windy day in Perth today and since I finished one of my essays for Asian studies, leaving me with some free time, I went to the local newspaper agency to buy myself some magazines. To be honest, I didn't actually buy any magazines - I ended up just browsing through some. (It's difficult to persuade myself to buy magazines when I still have the fourth and fifth volume of Game Of Thrones sitting next to my bed)
So while I was being a mooch at the magazine rack - I skimmed across a recipe in Jamie Oliver's magazine for chocolate tart.
Being me, I decided to give the recipe a try, tweaking it a bit as I went along, mostly because I couldn't recall the whole recipe and I was self conscious about going to my usual grocery store only to emerge with a basket of chocolate bars, cream and a ton of butter. To be honest I think I am known as the lady who goes in every week to buy six bottles of sparkling water and a bottle of cranberry juice.
I did emerge with a basket of chocolate bars, cream and a roll of ready-made Carême's dark chocolate shortcrust tart. I played it cool, so it was alright.
With Jamie Oliver's recipe, you need:
300ml double cream
200g 70% cocoa chocolate
50 ml whole milk
50g butter
2 tsp caster sugar
pinch of sea salt
375g ready-made shortcrust pastry
Preheat the oven to 180C
Roll out your pastry to line your greased tart tin, blind bake for 10-15 minutes
When pastry is dry and baked, let it cool while you make your chocolate ganache
Put the cream to a boil
As soon as cream boils up, take it off the heat and add in chocolate pieces
Stir until mixture is smooth and shiny
Pour mixture into cooled tart base
Leave in fridge to set for about 2 hours
Serve with ice cream, cream fraiche or as is
Like I said, I tweaked it a little, I got some really lovely dark chocolate shortcrust pastry from Carême pastries, you just have to let it defrost a bit so you can roll it out and have a lovely dark chocolate tart base. If you have dried beans or baking beans, use them so your tart base doesn't rise or bubble while you blind bake for about 10 to 15 minutes. I don't have either, so what I did was check it every couple of minutes, and if there was any bubbling I gently pressed it down with a clean dish towel.
I also got a packet of hazelnuts, which i roughly chopped up and folded into the chocolate ganache, as well as sprinkled over the top of the tart before i let it set. Hazelnuts with dark chocolate, really good combination, never doubt it. I also omitted the milk, butter and sugar, as the cream with chocolate already gave me the texture I needed for my tart.
Also, use the best dark chocolate you can find. If you don't like it too bitter, mix it some milk chocolate. To be honest, you will be melting in heavy cream so the bitterness is not too bad.
The best part of making this tart, other than the moment you eat it, is when you pour the ganache into the tart. Just seeing all that silky, thick chocolate mixture pebbled with hazelnuts, settling on the tart is a sight to behold.
Once it sets, cut yourself a slice or two, sit back and indulge. Make it for a party, make individual tarts, make one giant tart, serve it with ice cream, serve it with cream fraiche, have it with some strawberries, glazed cherries, serve it with tea/coffee/root beer /milkshakes, have it to yourself or show it off to your friends to create a chocolate coma tea party.
The word of the day is indulge, go forth and indulge.
No comments:
Post a Comment