Chocolate Covered Strawberry Tart

Some coworkers and I decided to form a dinner club to meet once a month. For the first meeting, we are doing French cuisine, and I am making dessert. I don't have a lot of experience making any French desserts, so I wanted to test out the recipe before I brought something before my friends. Let me tell you, this little experiment was more than I bargained for. Making an authentic fruit tart is quite involved and very time consuming. When all was said and done, it did taste absolutely delicious, but I haven't decided if it's worth the trouble to do this again. So I may be testing out another recipe soon. I combined and adapted a couple recipes that I found on Cook's Illustrated. You have to pay for a subscription to this site, but you can get a free 14-day trial if you want to peruse their recipes. The recipe will make one 9" tart or five 4" tarts.

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Tart

Pastry Cream

• 2 C half & half
• 1/2 C granulated sugar
• pinch of salt
• 5 lg egg yolks, chalazae removed (chalazae are cord like strands of egg white protein attached to the yolks)
• 3 Tbsp cornstarch
• 4 Tbsp unsalted butter (cold) cut into 4 pieces
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Heat half & half, 6 Tbsp sugar, and salt in medium heavy bottomed saucepan over medium heat until simmering, stirring occasionally to dissolve sugar.

Meanwhile, whisk the egg yolks in medium bowl until thoroughly combined.

Whisk in remaining 2 Tbsp sugar until sugar has begun to dissolve and mixture is creamy (about 15 seconds).

Whisk in cornstarch until combined and mixture is pale yellow and thick (about 30 seconds).

When half & half mixture reaches a full simmer, remove from heat.

Gradually whisk it into the yolk mixture to temper.

Return mixture to saucepan, scraping bowl with a rubber spatula.

Return to simmer over medium heat, whisking constantly, until 3 or 4 bubbles burst on surface and mixture is thickened and glossy (about 30 seconds).

Removed from heat. Whisk in butter and vanilla.

Transfer mixture to medium bowl.

Press plastic wrap directly on surface, and refrigerate until cold and set (at least 3 hours or up to 48 hours).

Tart Pastry (Pâte Sucrée)

• 1 lg egg yolk
• 1 Tbsp heavy cream
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/4 C all purpose flour
• 2/3 C confectioners sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 8 Tbsp unsalted butter (very cold), cut into 1/2" cubes

While pastry cream is chilling, whisk together yolk, cream, and vanilla in small bowl; set aside.

Pulse to combine flour, sugar, and salt in food processor fitted with steel blade.

Scatter butter pieces over flour mixture.

Pulse to cut butter into flour until mixture resembles course meal.

With machine running, add egg mixture and process until dough just comes together (about 25 seconds).

Turn dough onto sheet of plastic wrap and press into 6 inch disk. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate (at least 1 hour or up to 48 hours).

Remove dough from refrigerator (if refrigerated longer than 1 hour, let stand at room temperature until malleable). Unwrap dough and roll out between lightly floured sheets of parchment paper to diameter 1 inch larger than your tart pan. (If dough is soft and sticky, refrigerate until workable).

Transfer dough to tart pan with removable bottom. Working around the circumference, ease dough into pan corners by gently lifting and pressing. Press dough into the fluted sides of pan (if some edges are too thin, reinforce sides by folding excess dough back on itself). Run rolling pin over the top of pan to remove excess dough.

Set dough-lined tart pan in freezer for 30 minutes (can be frozen in a ziplock bag for up to one month).

Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375°. Set dough lined tart pan on a baking sheet. Press a square of foil inside frozen tart shell and over edges and fill with metal or ceramic pie weights (in a pinch, dry beans will work too).

Bake until golden brown (about 30 minutes), rotating halfway through baking time. Remove from oven and carefully remove foil and weights. Return baking sheet to oven and continue baking for 5-8 minutes longer. Set tart pans on wire rack to cool to room temperature (about 30 minutes).

Ganache

• 3/4 C heavy cream
• 2 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 6 oz semi-sweet chocolate
• 1 Tbsp Cognac

You can use just about any chocolate to make ganache, but as I have a refined tasted for chocolate, I chose Scharffen Berger. In the hierarchy of grocery store chocolates available to me, this is the best, followed by Ghirardelli, then your Nestle and Hershey's . For this recipe, I felt I couldn't do it justice with the "cheap" stuff.

Chop the chocolate into small/fine pieces.

Bring the cream and butter to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat.

Add the Cognac to the saucepan.

I don't regularly have cognac on hand, but any nice flavored liqueur will do. I had this lovely chocolate liqueur on hand, so I used that.

Place the chocolate in a bowl. Pour the hot cream over the chocolate.

Whisk until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth and thickened.

Let stand at room temperature for 1 hour, until spreadable.

To assemble:

When tart shell is completely cool, spread a layer of ganache in the bottom. Place the shell in the refrigerator to allow chocolate to set up (about 10-15 minutes or 5 in the freezer).

Spread the cold pastry cream over bottom.

Arrange strawberries on top of pastry cream.

Drizzle ganache over the strawberries.

Remove outer metal ring of tart pan, slide a metal spatula or the tip of a knife between the bottom of the crust and tart pan bottom to release and serve.

You can also glaze the tarts for added presentation, but I didn't do that because I had worked on these tarts for about 7 hours, and I was tired. If you glaze them, place them in the refrigerator to allow the ganache drizzled on top to set. To glaze, bring 1/2 C of apple jelly to a boil in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally to smooth out lumps. When jelly is completely melted and boiling, apply the jelly to the berries by dabbing with a pastry brush. Refrigerate to cool and set glaze.