Good morning all. I’m taking a few minutes out before I begin the study time to bequeath onto you the first of my chocolate cookalongs recipes. Now, I chose a few different things to make, as I wanted to look at the versatility of chocolate. However, as a complete and utter chocaholic, this ended up as a much more chocolatey dessert than originally meant. In for a penny, in for a pound as they say.

 

Do I regret it? A solid and and enthusiastic no! The tart base was just lovely. Not overly sweet, not overly chocolatey, and quite fine and melt in your mouth. The ganache was just gorgeous. I may or may not have conducted the odd taste test every 7 or so minutes to ensure the outstanding quality. For quality assurance purposes you understand… And the toffee was a last minute addition. I was debating between caramelised banana a la Dorie Greenspan and raspberries as I had a lovely punnet lazing around my kitchen. And then the twitterverse hummed and hawed over fruit, and I decided… Toffee! Well Like Mam use to bake put me onto a lovely Rachel allen recipe and my ever building store cupboard provided the ingredients without having to pop out to the shops. It was meant to be. So I made 2 with toffee and 2 with crushed sugared raspberries. And they were both beautiful. The proof is in the pictures!

Oh hello lovely.

 

So now I am going to share this recipe with you. The chocolate base and ganache are originally from Dorie Greenspan’s ‘Around my French Table’, a wonderful cookbook may I add. The toffee sauce is a la Rachel Allen. I recommend making this and just having for drizzling, decorating, eating with a spoon., you know yourself!

You will need:

• Base
  • 150g flour
  • 30g icing sugar
  • 30g cocoa
  • 130g butter (unsalted)
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 large free range egg yolk
• Toffee Sauce
  • 110g butter
  • 250g light brown sugar
  • 275 g golden syrup (I stand this in a bowl of warm water to loosen it up a but before measuring)
  • 225ml double cream
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• Yummy yummy ganache
  • 220g chocolate (I used a mix of 61 and 74%)
  • 220mls of double cream
  • 60 g of soft unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1. Ok. First off make your pastry.
2. Sift all the dry ingredients together, and add your small pieces of cold butter. Rub in (or blitz) until they resemble breadcrumbs.
3. Add your egg yolk in and bring it all together.
4. To get it all together without overworking the pastry I turned it out onto a surface covered in greaseproof paper and lightly kneaded it. Hardly kneaded actually, just pushed it together until even.
5. Then wrap in clingfilm and pop into the fridge for at least a half hour.
6. While this was cooling I actually made a devils food cake. But I highly advise chilling out and enjoying this strange sunny time we’re having. Oh and you can butter your tart tins. I used 4 mini tart tins because that’s what I had and they’re adorable to boot.
7. Ok so, your pastry is ready to go – divide out into 4 (if youhave 4 tins..) and lightly roll out. On Dorie’s suggestion I made quite a thick base because the dough is rather lovely. Press into your pastry case and ensure it’s even. Trim the excess off. I then froze all 4 tarts for 30 minutes, again on Dorie’s suggestion. So at this point, preheat your oven to 180 degrees.
8. After 30 minutes take your tarts out of the freezer and pop some greased paper on them with baking beans(If you don’t have the specific ones, you can use normal dried beans). We’re going to blind bake for 30 minutes.
9. So pop in oven for 30 minutes until pastry is done. I left them about 5-10 minutes, and then very carefully unmold your tarts and set aside to cool.

 

1. It’s toffee time. And it’s mightily easy. And this makes a massive excess of toffee sauce but definitely worth making.
2. Take all of your ingredients, put them in a saucepan, and melt. Bring to the boil for 4-5 minutes. I actually wanted a slightly stiffer toffee so I boiled for about 8 minutes until it had thickened nicely. Oh and be sure not to let it boil over! My sugar thermometer is at home so I can’t tell you what temperature that was, I do apologise.
3. Thats it!
4. When your tart shells are cooled fully, pour a thin but significant layer of toffee onto the shells! Leave in the fridge or a cold place to set.

 

1. In the meantime, make your ganache. Again, startlingly easy.
2. Finely chop your chocolate and put in a bowl.
3. Bring your cream to a boil in a saucepan, and then pour the cream over the chocolate.
4. Leave for a minute, and then stir to bring it all together. Start from the middle and work out. When the two are mixed, stir in your pieces of soft butter until melted.
5. Voila, you have a ganache. I left mine on the counter for a wee while before pouring onto the set toffee tarts. Don’t let it cool to point of setting, but do let the heat go out of it so your toffee doesn’t melt when the chocolate hits it. Again, then pour the chocolate into the tarts, and leave to set in the fridge.

When these are set, dust each one in icing sugar, top with a handful of fresh raspberries or strawberries, and dive right in! Absolutely beautiful tarts, ever so pleased with them!

 

Jennifer can give you a verdict on them, we devoured these on Friday night. Mine is scrumdiddleyumptious!