Dark Chocolate Mousse Tart

Intense. That's one word that perfectly describes this dark chocolate mousse tart. Intense colour, intense flavour and intensely ... satisfying too. If you've visited this blog lately, you'll know full well how I've been consumed with making pastry off late. Pies, tarts, puffs ... that's about all I've been making for the last couple of weeks. And so, when I watched Mindy, a contestant on Masterchef Australia (season 4) make a chocolate mousse tart with a chocolate shortcrust pastry shell, I knew I had to give it a go. A chocolate crust: wow! (Mindy went on to win the challenge and her tart was featured on the cover of the Masterchef magazine — didn't know there was such a mag. But you can check it our here).




So anyway, I decided to follow her recipe for two reasons: first, it looked bloody good — chocolate on chocolate? I mean who can resist, right? Second, while I love watching episodes of Masterchef (the Australian one, not the American version),  I am always curious about how good the dishes really are. I mean, the ones that the judges rave on about. The abilities of the home cooks are without a doubt gasp-worthy but I just wonder how the dishes actually taste. So, by trying out Mindy's recipe, I'd be able to satisfy my curiosity.




I followed her recipe with minimal changes: she poured a caramel orange syrup over her tart, I chose to drizzle a spiced orange syrup instead. Also, she used 3 egg yolks on top of 2 whole eggs, I just used 2 yolks as I had just four eggs left at home.

The instructions in Mindy's recipe were easy enough to follow. The crust used a fair amount of cocoa powder which was combined with flour, icing sugar and ground almonds. It's a shortcrust pastry: chilled butter is rubbed into the dry ingredients and then a liquid (in this case an egg) is added to bind the dough together. The pastry was rich and very chocolaty. It was also a little more wet than your regular shortcrust shell. I liked the taste: it wasn't too sweet ... in fact it wasn't sweet at all, allowing the chocolate to be the star ingredient and flavour. I might try using ground hazelnuts instead of almonds the next time as I think hazelnuts go so well with chocolate. (I did try using hazelnuts and it was brilliant. I think I'd go with hazelnuts in future. It also combines well with the cocoa and flour and you don't see specks of beige as with the almonds). But, yeah it turned out to be a really nice crust.



The end product was a deeply satisfying chocolate treat. Rich, warm and comforting and "super yum", as the judges on the show eloquently described it. Super yum indeed.

Chocolate Mousse Tart
(Adapted from Mindy Woods recipe from Masterchef)

For the pastry
100g plain flour
70g cocoa powder
pinch of salt
60g icing sugar
20g ground almonds
90g butter, chilled and cubed
1 egg




For the mousse
275g dark chocolate
140g butter
2 eggs
2 egg yolks (the original had 3 egg yolks)
110g castor sugar
zest of one orange

Orange syrup (not from the original recipe)
3 tbsp castor sugar
3 tbsp orange juice
1 tbsp orange zest
3 tbsp water
1 star anise

For the pastry, whisk the flour, sugar, ground almond and cocoa together in a bowl. Add the cold butter and rub into the flour mixture with fingertips until you get what resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Add the egg and bring the crumbs together to form a dough. It will be slightly (just slightly) wet. Shape into a disc and chill for at least 30 mins.

Once chilled, place the disc in between two sheets of non grease paper and roll till about 4 mm thick. transfer onto the tart pan (10-inch) and gently mould to fit the pan.

Prick the base of the pastry case with a fork and chill for 15 mins. Meanwhile preheat the oven to 180C. Pre-bake the crust for 15 mins, until the base of the pastry has dried and hardened a little.

For the filling, add he chocolate and butter in a bowl and place the bowl above a pot of simmering water. Stir until both the butter and chocolate melts and becomes a shiny ganache. Remove and let cool.

Turn the heat off the water but keep the pan on the stove. Add the eggs, yolks and sugar in a bowl and place the bowl above the steaming water. Whisk with an electric hand held mixer or a balloon whisk till the mixture almost tripled in volume and you can form ribbons with the mixture. Stir in the zest.

Add to the cooled chocolate ganache (in three installments) and fold in gently.

Pour the filling into the pre-baked crust and bake for 18 mins. Remove and cool.

Make the syrup: add all the ingredients in a saucepan and heat until sugar dissolves and the syrup thickens. Drizzle over tart.

Tangerine-Almond Tart with Chocolate Drizzle

Crust:

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 tsp grated tangerine or orange zest
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 8 tbs unsalted butter, cold, cut into cubes
• 1 large egg yolk (save the white for the filling!)

Filling:

• 1/2 cup slivered almonds
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 egg white
• 1/2 cup tangerine juice (about 3 tangerines) or orange juice
• zest of 3 tangerines (about 3 tsp)
• 3 oz semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 400. Butter the bottom of a 9.5-in two piece tart pan. In a food processor, process the flour 1/3 cup sugar, zest, and salt for a few seconds to combine. Add the butter, and process until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the egg yolk (don't forget to save the white for the filling) and process just until it comes together in a ball. Pat the dough into the tart pan, prick the bottom all over with a fork, and then bake for 18-20 minutes. Set aside.

2. Turn oven down to 375. Clean out your food processor. Place almonds on a cookie sheet and toast in the oven for 3 to 5 minutes, until golden and fragrant. Let cool for a few minutes.

3. Place the almonds and 1/3 cup sugar into the food processor and process until almonds are ground. Add eggs, egg white, tangerine juice, and zest to the processor, and process until well blended. Scatter half of your chocolate chips over the crust. Pour the tangerine filling into the crust.

4. Bake the tart at 375 for about 25-30 minutes. The filling should be set. Melt your remaining chocolate chips in a double boiler (I used a small metal bowl placed over a pot of boiling water -- the bowl should be above and not touching the water), or you can use a microwave if you have one of those newfangled gadgets. Drizzle the chocolate decoratively over the tart (see my tip in the paragraph preceding the recipe!)

Pineapple Tarts Recipe

Fillings:
2 cans pineapple chunks
1/2 cups sugar
1/2 tsp salt

1. Place pineapple chunks into a food processor to blend until fine but not liquefy.
2. Use a strainer and strain off excessive liquid.
3. Heat a pan, add in pineapple pulp. Stir for couple minutes and add in sugar and salt. Cook until mixture is thicken like jam. Let cool for couple hours or overnight.
4. Form into small balls.


Dough:
1 1/2 stick unsalted butter (soften at room temp.)
1 egg yolk
60 gm icing sugar
1 tsp salt
290 gm all purpose flour
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp cornstarch
2 tbsp custard powder + 2 tbsp water
1 egg yolk + 2 tbsp water for eggwash

Method:
1. Combine ingredients except for egg yolk. Form into a dough. Add in egg yolk at the end and knead well. Cover and refrigerate for 1 hr.
2. Divide the dough into pieces enough to cover the pineapple balls. Use a piece of dough to cover the pineapple and flatten into shape. Cut lines to make it look like pineapple. Continue with the rest of the dough. Place on baking pan with parchment paper.
3. Preheat to 350 F.
4. Mix egg yolk and water to make eggwash. Brush over tarts.
5. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden.

Garlic Tart with Cream Cheese and Spinach Recipe

Ingredients :
I frozen pie crust
1 garlic bulb (about 10 cloves, unpeeled)
1/2 cup parsley
1 cup spinach
6 oz. cream cheese
4 oz. half-and-half cream
3 eggs, beaten
Salt and pepper to taste

How To Prepare :
1. Pre-bake the pie crust according to manufacturer's instructions. Cool. Simmer the garlic cloves until soft, about 25 minutes.
2. Drain and cool. Mash to a paste and remove the peels. Cook the parsley and spinach in water until tender, 8-10 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water.
3. Squeeze out as much liquid as possible and chop finely.
4. Mix in the garlic paste and spread the mixture evenly over the bottom of the pie crust.
5. Mix thoroughly the cream cheese and the cream. Add the beaten eggs.
6. season with salt and pepper.
7. Pour the egg-cheese mixture over the parsley-spinach-garlic paste and bake at 350 degrees F until set, about 25 minutes.