If you have a notion to make a tart mid-week, and you don’t get home till about 7pm then you really need to use bought pastry.
And if your rolling pin is in the country and you are in the city, then you need to use pre-rolled bought pastry.
So, I swallowed my pride and bought pre-rolled shortcrust pastry tonight. I think it may be a first. And now that my pride is well and truly swallowed, I can admit that it probably won’t be the last!
My notion was to make a rich chocolate tart. I’d been thinking of rich chocolate tart since before breakfast (I know, I know, this isn’t healthy behaviour) and then I went out to lunch with the lovely PAtothecity and she told me all about her fabulous Hotel Chocolat experience yesterday evening, including chilli hot chocolate. She asked how to make chilli hot choc, and I have a sneaky feeling I read a recipe for it just the other day, but have NO IDEA where, probably somewhere on this world wide web. Anyway, I suggested she split a chilli in half longways, de-seeded it and then popped the chilli in a pan with the milk. Warm it up and steep the chilli milk for a few minutes (depending on desired heat). Then remove the chillis, and add the chocolate, and warm to the right temperature for your hot choc.
With this in mind, I decided my chocolate tart would be a chilli chocolate tart. A RICH chilli chocolate tart. A rich chilli chocolate tart with sea salt flakes.
Rich chilli chocolate tart with sea salt flakes
Rich chilli chocolate tart with sea salt flakes
Preheat oven to 180C or Gas Mark 4. Grease a 23cm/9″ tart tin.
- A packet of ready rolled short crust pastry, or if you have time, make your own pastry
- 300ml double cream
- a couple of fresh red chillis
- 2 tsp caster sugar
- 50g unsalted butter
- 200g dark chocolate
- a big glug of full fat milk
- some maldon sea salt
- Line the prepared tin with your rolled out pastry. Cover the pastry with a large piece of baking paper and fill the paper with dry chick peas, or baking beans* or rice, or whatever you can find in a packet or jar to weigh down the pastry.
- Bake for 10-15 minutes
- Take the pastry out of the oven and remove the paper and the baking beans
- Return the pastry to the oven and bake for another 15 minutes, till golden brown
- While it’s in the oven you can get going on the rich chocolatey-ness
- Cut the chillis in half longways, and de-seed. Put them in a saucepan with the cream and warm up to not-quite-boiling
- Leave to steep for a wee minute or two, and then remove the chillies (and throw them away)
- Add the sugar and a pinch of salt to the cream and heat back up till it boils. Remove from the heat immediately, and add the butter and chocolate (broken into chunks) to the pan
- Beat with a wooden spoon till all melted and glossy and nummy
- Put aside for a wee minute or ten (depending on how cold your kitchen is – mine is freezing, so I just left it for a couple of minutes and it had cooled down quite a bit) and then add a glug or two of milk (about what you’d add to a mug of coffee.
- Keep beating till it comes all glossy again
- Now, if your pastry shell has just come out of the oven you’ll need it to cool a wee bit before you go any further
- Once both shell and chocolatey goodness are cool-ish pour the choc mixture into the shell. Cool at room temperature, and then sprinkle with sea salt flakes
If you have a hot kitchen, or if you like really cold things, cool it further down in the fridge. But personally, I’d serve it at room temperature, with a scoop of creme fraiche.
Now, all I have to do is work out how to get it to the office tomorrow morning.
And, given that St Valentine’s Day is next week, this might be an appropriate recipe for wooing your loved one. It would certainly work for me, but then I’m particularly susceptible to that chocolatey, salty, hot chilli combo of flavours. And not too sweet. All I need to know now is what wine to serve with it, as I suspect that it won’t work with fizz. Better ask Convivium Wine.
Shewolfinthevalley 
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