TwD: Chocolate Truffle Tartlets

It's another round of TWD baking and I'm glad that these Chocolate Truffle Tartlets  -- one of the delicious recipes found in Dorie Greenspan's Baking With Julia -- was chosen very early in the game because I can say that I have now found a gem of a dessert that I will be making quite often! This is a truly intense and insanely chocolaty tart that bursts with varying flavors and textures with each bite.  In fact, you get a different flavor component from each square inch of the tart thanks to the chunks of white and milk chocolate and the crunchy almond-flavored pieces of amaretti di sarrono cookies mixed into the luscious dark chocolate filling.  

From the food processor, the dough was crumbly as described in the recipe

But I was easily able to shape it into a square while the crumbly dough was inside the plastic wrap (just to make sure nothing sticks to my fingers)

The chocolate tart shells have a strong chocolate flavor and a superb flakiness and slight crunchiness to them that really mimic a buttery chocolate cookie/wafer.  I was actually very surprised at how the tart shells tasted as I thought adding a mere quarter of a cup of cocoa powder to the dough was only to give a slight hint of chocolate flavor.  Boy was I wrong!  I was also surprised at how easy these were to whip up.  I used a food processor to make them which made things a lot faster for me and in a way, fool-proof.  I just made sure that the butter was really cold (I even popped the chopped pieces in the freezer before putting them in the FP).  Then I made sure not to over-process the dough, adding the tablespoon of ice water when slightly larger chunks of butter remain.  

My 4-year-old eagerly awaits this delicious chocolate treat!

Rolling the dough was quite easy to do and I would work one piece at a time, putting the other dough pieces inside the fridge as they await their turn.  The dough was a little sticky too and I had to lightly flour the surface of the counter and put a sheet of plastic wrap on top of it as I was rolling which prevented it from sticking to my rolling pin.  I also had to use a bench scraper to pry it away from the surface and help me transfer the rolled dough to the tart molds.  

Chopped white and milk chocolate

I used 4 pieces of Amaretti di Saronno cookies

Roughly chopped Amaretti cookies

While I was chilling the tart shells in the fridge I pre-heated the oven and prepared the ingredients for the chocolate filling -- separated eggs, melted butter and dark chocolate and chopped the 4 ounces total of white and milk chocolates as well as the amaretti cookies.  After 30 minutes or so, I slid the tartlets inside the oven and baked them for a few minutes.

Pre-baked tartlets

While the tartlet shells are cooling, I went ahead and made the filling -- beat the yolks and sugar until ribbon stage then folded in the melted chocolate and butter mixture in 2 stages.

I placed the chopped chocolates and amaretti cookies inside the tartlets instead of folding into the chocolate mixture to prevent melting and dissolving of the cookies

 I didn't fold the chunks of chocolate and amaretti cookies into the chocolate mixture directly.  Instead, I scattered the pieces inside each of the cooled shells first just to make sure that each tartlet would get roughly the same amount of chocolaty and crunchy bits and also to prevent the cookies from dissolving into the mixture while folding.

Covered with the chocolate mixture

After baking -- puffed up a bit

I had about 2 cups of leftover chocolate filling (even though my tart molds were the right size) but instead of throwing it away or putting it in the fridge and not know what to do with it afterwards, I placed a cup each in ramekins and baked them alongside the tartlets.  So I ended up with a bonus dessert -- Chocolate Souffle!!  They baked 10 minutes longer than the tartlets and puffed up nicely.

Left over filling that I turned into chocolate souffle!!

Delicious -- ate this with whipped cream and blackberries :-)

I didn't find the chocolate filling to be overly sweet which gave room for me to drizzle more white chocolate on top for garnish.  And since I love chocolate with raspberries, I just had to put some too!  And WOW -- this was just out-of-this-world good!  You'd think that putting all of these would be overkill but it's absolutely not!  

More pics for your viewing pleasure...

You can still see the flecks of butter in the crust 

You can see the delicious chunks of chocolate and cookies inside

Looks so lovely with the raspberries on top

YUM!!

I find this recipe to be quite versatile -- you can put whatever complementary ingredients you like -- nuts, liquor and fruits (fresh or dried) would be lovely additions.  Even chocolates that already have fruits and nuts in them would give a different flavor profile to the tarts.  Oh, and I think topping these with ice cream or whipped cream would be awesome as well!


This week's TWD hosts are Steph, Spike, Jaime, and Jessica and you should be able to find the recipe of these tartlets posted in their blogs.