Salted caramel chocolate tart

A while ago, I found this recipe for a salted caramel chocolate tart, and thought it looked amazing. Time to give it a try! The recipe is pretty much untouched, except I went with my own sweetened shortcrust pastry recipe for the case.

Salted Caramel Chocolate Tart
Ingredients
For the pastry

• 170g Plain flour
• 100g Butter
• 20g Caster sugar
• ~3tbsp Cold water

For the chocolate filling

• 180ml Double cream
• 120ml Milk
• 340g Dark chocolate
• 2 Eggs

For the salted caramel

• 190g Caster sugar
• 85g Butter
• 120ml Double cream
• 1 1/2 tsp Salt

Method

1. Rub the flour, butter and sugar together until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs.
2. Add the cold water and form into a dough.
3. Seal in a freezer bag and refrigerate for ~30 mins.
4. Roll out to ~4mm thick and line a pie tin.
5. Prick the base with a fork and weigh down with baking beans.
6. Bake at ~180C for 10 minutes, remove the baking beans and bake for a further ~20 mins.
7. Remove to cool.
8. Scald the cream and milk in a pan, then pour into the dark chocolate. Stir until glossy and smooth.
9. Beat the eggs in a bowl.
10. Slowly pour a quarter of the chocolate mixture into the eggs, beating rapidly to prevent them from scrambling. Once fully incorporated, pour the chocolate/egg mixture back into the chocolate/cream/milk mixture and mix.
11. Pour into the pastry shell and bake at 160C for ~30 mins until set.
12. Heat the sugar in a pan until it melts and turns brown.
13. Add the butter and stir until the butter is melted.
14. Add the cream and boil for ~1 minute, beating rapidly.
15. Stir in the salt and allow to cool for ~15 mins.
16. Pour the caramel mixture over the tart.
17. Refrigerate for ~2 hours.

So the first thing to note is that the original recipe said that it made a single 10" tart... but my pie dish is closer to 6" in diameter. I didn't notice this until I was making the chocolate filling, and thinking "that looks like a lot of mixture". Whoops. If I'd halved the quantities for the filling and the caramel, it would have been about right. In the end, I decided to pour the leftover filling into a bowl and cooked it in the oven in a bain-marie; so there's effectively a second pastry-less tart!

Here's how much filling I had left over! This is after cooking, which is why it doesn't look all that smooth.

About to pour the caramel on!

Looks lovely, doesn't it?

After about an hour in the fridge, I was brave enough to remove the tart from the pan. It almost stayed intact!

 Not quite set, but we got impatient. Garnished with a little coarse salt, I think it looks fabulous!

Okay, we should have waited until it was fully set, so the caramel has at least partially run off where it's been cut. But don't tell me that it doesn't look good!

So how was it? Gorgeous. Decadent. Oh-so-unhealthy. Essentially everything a dessert like this should be. It was definitely better once it had cooled fully and set properly, but even while still a bit warm it was absolutely delicious. The chocolate is so intense and decadent - it's essentially one giant chocolate truffle - and the caramel is wonderfully rich. This is not a dessert that you'd want more than a thin slice of, but definitely one that's worth the effort of making!