yesterday.. with all that snow and breeze... all i yearned for all day was... something sweet... something spicy.. something gingery yet gorgeously chocolaty ... so at lunch time... i googled and rampaged the internet in search of that perfect recipe for me... while gingersnap cookies and dark chocolate tart with gingersnap crust were close contenders... by themselves, they weren't enough. i wanted more. wanted them both all at once.. in a bite... so after returning home i set out to tweak the two and mix-and-match their recipes to create my own chocolaty-gingery-deliciousness... Chocolat à Gingembre Tartelettes, that is Chocolate in Ginger Tartlets. the name was an afterthought. after the first bite i was convinced that i had tasted something awesome.. something that demanded a better name than chocolate in ginger tartlets.. so i googled a little more and decided on naming my dessert after a close cousin of it... Tartelettes au Chocolat et Gingembre Confit...
okay.. so with all that exuberance you must have realized by now how happy this dessert made me.... Nishi LOVED it and so did my little one... since we could not resist the sight of chocolate, we had it for breakfast this morning and were absolutely delighted. ... the heat of the ginger balanced out the bitter sweetness of the coffee and chocolates so..oo well. whats more... the chocolate filling in the tarts is devoid of any cream or butter. pureed tofu does the work instead while assuring your taste buds all along that they are having nothing but the best... also, with that added touch Nuttela, I am certain that these tartlets will be a party-winner everytime.... irrespective of whether it is a party for kids or grownups...
ingredients:
for the tart shells: (using the proportions below i made 15 gingersnap cookies and 6 tart shells)
3/8 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
1/4 cup unsulphured molasses
1/4 cup cup pureed tofu(i used 7oz lite firm tofu pureed with 1/4 cup applesauce)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 2/3 cups + 6 tablespoon all-purpose-flour
1/3 cup oats flour (i ground old fashioned oats)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 inch ginger freshly grated
7 cloves ground
for the chocolate filling : (the proportions given here filled the 6 tart shells to the brim)
1/4 cup semi-sweet choco chips
1/2 cup pureed tofu(i used 7oz lite firm tofu pureed with 1/4 cup applesauce)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/8 cup espresso
3 tablespoon Nutella (Chocolate Hazelnut Spread)
for garnish:
4 almonds grated
3 almonds chopped lengthwise in half
6 raisins chopped in halves.
what i did:
For the ginger shells, I sifted all the dry ingredients together and kept the mixture aside. Next, I whisked both the sugars and molasses along with butter until the mixture looked smooth and uniform. to this, i then added the pureed tofu, vinegar and grated ginger and beat the mixture some more. finally i folded in the dry ingredients into the wet mixture, 1/4 cup at a time. after a while when the mixture became dough-like and tough to whisk, i kneaded in the remaining dry ingredients into it. then i let the prepared dough rest for about 30 minutes on the kitchen counter.
In the meantime, I preheated the oven to 350 degrees F; lined a two baking sheets with parchment paper and 6 of a 12 cup muffin tray with paper baking cups and prepared the chocolate filling.
For the chocolate filling, I put the pureed tofu, espresso and vanilla extract in a saucepan and simmered the mixture over low heat for about 3-4 minutes. next i added the semi-sweet chocochips in the mixture and let it stand for a few minutes until chocolate chips got soft, then i whisked the mixture until it became smooth. finally i added in the Nutella one tablespoon at a time and stirred some more till the mixture acquired the colour and consistency of chocolate ganache.
Next, I rolled 15 walnut sized balls and 6 lemon sized balls of the dough. and while i set the walnut sized balls on the baking sheet and put them to bake for 22-25 minutes, i pressed the lemon sized balls against the walls of the prepared baking cups all the time trying to make sure that the dough walls have an equal thickness on all sides. at this point i also sprinkled some grated almonds into each of the dough shells.
After the first set of ginger cookies were done, I put in the prepared muffin tray into the oven. 25 minutes later when I pulled out the muffin tray from the oven, the "shells" looked somewhat like this...
their centers had puffed up ... but since the gingery bakes were still soft ... so i pressed the center down with a small spoon like this....
and shaped the bakes into gingery tart shells... and this is how the shells looked after being pressed...
I then let the prepared shells rest for a while, about one hour, before pouring the chocolate filling into them. Finally i garnished them with almonds and raisins. and because Valentine's dry is around the corner and I heart my husband and he hearts chocolates, i did one last thing...before putting these chocolate filled ginger shells to refrigerate overnight... I doodled a little chocolate heart on the almond in his tartlet...
kiddish yet cute... isn't it :)
notes and after thoughts
as i mentioned, i adapted the cookie dough recipe from Joy of Baking. There, she tells you to bake the cookies until they are dry and firm on top. That made me bake them for 25 minutes. Though with the added moisture from the chocolate filling, 25 minutes of baking seemed just right for the tart shells, the cookies felt hard. maybe 20-22 minutes of baking time and few hours of cooling would be perfect for the desired snappiness of the cookies.
since i had not baked eggless gingersnaps before, i set out with a little more ingredients than would be required just for the ginger tart shells. with the extra dough i baked 2 trays of cookies before starting on the Chocolat à Gingembre Tartelettes. baking the cookies first, helped me decide on how i needed to treat the cookie dough in order to create the ginger shells.
in the recipe for the chocolate filling i added only 3 tablespoons of Nuttla, because while mixing, that felt very sweet. however it did not seem too sweet after cooling. though the sweetness was perfect for us, if you like your desserts really sweet you can probably add few more spoons of Nuttela in the filling and enjoy the deliciousness....
Happy baking !! and fill me with your notes and comments on this if you stop by... I'll love to hear...
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Vardhini's event Bake Fest # 16-Cooks Joy hosted by Surabhi of My Cook Book
Bon Vivant #12 - Quixotic Fixes at Summee's Culinary Bites
Healthy Food for Healthy Kids - Event at Nithu's Kitchen
Vardhini's event Sweet Luv 2013: Event Announcement (CJ #4) at Cooks Joy
Cook like a Celebrity Chef at Food Corner
umm ummm ummmm... Don't know if I can say more. Love it!
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting Sumee :)
DeleteInviting tartelette and the choc filling is yummy.
ReplyDeleteVardhini
Event: Sweet Luv - 2013
Glad you liked it :)
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