Second year of business school is a pretty glorious time for me. Not only do I (sort of) have this whole school thing down, my classes this quarter are interesting but don’t have a ton of work, I have a good sense of who my friends are PLUS I’m lucky enough to have already signed a job offer for when I graduate. To quote the great French Montana, “I ain’t worried ’bout nothin'” (well, except the things I AM worried about… but that’s another post).
This has basically left me with some time on my hands. Last year around this time not only was I knee deep in learning how to be a student again after 7 years out of the game, but I was also in the thick of trying to get a job in consulting. So without my social calendar packed with recruiting events, I find that I have these stretches of time for me, myself and I. Which explains why the blog is back with a vengeance.
It’s not like I stopped cooking over the past year. Quite the contrary, a student budget generally means more meals at home + I like to entertain, so I often have people over to dinner. I just didn’t make a ton of time to blog. But now, there’s time a plenty and I’m happy to blog away.
While I cooked a lot over the past year, I didn’t always do a ton of experimenting or make seemingly complicated things. Like these tarts. The other day I looked at my calendar and literally had NOTHING on it. Not a class, not a meeting… nothing. It was the perfect afternoon for a baking project. I have a few cookbooks that I turn to when I want a more involved baking project including the cookbook from Tartine Bakery in San Francisco. Which is how I found the recipe for this chocolate hazelnut tart. It seemed simple enough, didn’t require too many ingredients and I knew it would appear somewhat impressive to anyone who would receive the gift of tart. Done.
The tarts weren’t that hard to make if you’re not intimidated by things like crust-making. The end result was good but super rich… so much pure chocolate. It was almost too chocolatey and probably would’ve been better served with some ice cream. In all fairness I didn’t include the orange in the filling because I’m not a big fan of the orange/chocolate combination. I generally tend to like my fruit and chocolate separate. If I were to make these again I might even consider making them in muffin tins or something for even smaller tarts OR making a large tart so that I could eat a smaller wedge.
Tartine’s Chocolate Hazelnut Tarts
Makes 4 4in tarts
Pate sablee
130g (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup (100g) caster sugar
Pinch of salt
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 3/4 cups (250g) flour
Chocolate and hazelnut filling
170g chocolate, chopped
115g unsalted butter
¼ cup (60mL) brandy (optional)
2/3 cup (135g) sugar
3 large eggs
1/8 tsp salt
Zest of half an orange
140g hazelnuts, lightly toasted (at lowest oven temp for about 10mins), skins rubbed off and some roughly chopped
For the pate sablee (to be made at least 2 hours in advanced)
Cream butter, sugar and salt until light and fluffy, mix in the egg until combined. Add the flour and mix until just incorporated (it is important to not overmix/overhandle at this step otherwise your dough will strink when baked).
On a lightly floured surface, gather the dough and shape into a 1cm-thick disk, wrap in cling wrap and chill for at least 2 hours or overnight. Roll dough out to a 3mm thickness on a floured surface (lightly flour rolling pin and both sides of the dough to discourage sticking). Cut a circle roughly 5cm bigger than the tart tin and carefully line the tart tin (if the dough has become too soft to work with, put it in the refrigerator for a few minutes). If the dough develops any tears, patch it up with a little extra dough. Trim the dough to level the top of the tart tin with a knife or rolling pin (by rolling it over the surface to “cut” the dough).
Chill the pastry shells in the refrigerator until firm, about 15 minutes. Preheat the oven to 160C Prick the base of each pastry with a fork, line tarts with baking paper and fill with a layer of ceramic pie weights, rice or beans (the latter two could be saved and reused). Bake in oven for 15 minutes, or until slightly golden. Cool completely on a wire rack.
For the filling
Preheat oven to 160C
Place chocolate in a heatproof mixing bowl. In a saucepan, combine the butter, brandy (if using) and 1/3 cup of the sugar and heat over medium-low heat and stir until butter melts and sugar dissolves. Pour the butter mixture over the chocolate and stir until the chocolate melts.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the remaining sugar, eggs, salt and orange zest and mix until mixture is pale yellow. Pour one third of the egg mixture into the chocolate mixture and whisk to lighten, and then pour the remaining egg mixture in. Pour the filling into the pastry shell and arrange the hazelnuts evenly on top. Bake for 10-15 minutes until surface of filling loses some of its shine but hasn’t souffleed. Remove from oven and cool completely on wire rack.
Recipe adapted from
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