By Genevieve Ko, The New York Times
It’s been a hard year, and finding small joys feels particularly important right now around the holidays. When I considered which treat could deliver that happiness in this season (aside from cookies, of course), I remembered the first pastry I learned as a restaurant cook. In the basement corner of a little French bistro, we turned out chocolate tarts, the elegant little black dress of desserts.
Fashioned in the style of renowned chef Joël Robuchon’s recipe, the filling was as creamy as pudding and as silky and softly set as crème brûlée. With a buttery, crisp crust, the tart made the diners feel special and the cooks feel empowered by their baking prowess.
This big chocolate tart does the same and requires no professional training to guarantee stunning results.
In a significant departure from most tarts, it’s made in a rectangular cake pan. The speed bump edges of a fluted tart pan, and even the smooth lines of a tart ring, necessitate stressful dough rolling, fussy parbaking and risky crust unmolding. And even the biggest tart pan doesn’t make enough wedges to feed a crowd.
In this take on a tart, the crumbs of a cocoa dough are simply pressed across the bottom of the pan. The filling, usually a blend of cream, milk, chocolate and eggs, swaps fresh milk for sweetened condensed milk to ensure that the custard doesn’t break, since it covers the football field expanse of a cake pan.
I first learned this canned milk trick while working on a cookbook with pastry chef Pichet Ong. The sugar in condensed milk has been inverted, meaning the bonds between glucose and fructose molecules have been broken. And, as Ong explained, that altered state ensures “a velvety smooth texture because the sugar has been stabilized and won’t crystallize once it sets.” Here, it also has the added benefit of being carried by dairy.
“It’s extra milky and helps offset the bitterness of the cocoa,” Ong said. “It gives it a sweetness that’s not cloying and a deeper sweetness than granulated.”
Along with cream and a generous pinch of salt, the canned milk accentuates the chocolate and makes this tart delicious on its own. But it can also be a blank canvas. The tops of the individual portions can receive the crunch of nuts or flaky salt, the chew of candied orange peel or ginger, or the pop of tangy freeze-dried berries.
The portions can also be sliced in any shape or size you want. When cutting the tart, I was inspired by artist Piet Mondrian’s later abstract works, which showcase the beauty of squares and rectangles, and by their connection to his early figurative landscape paintings.
At their core, both styles of painting are fundamentally compositions. I’m not, by any stretch, comparing dessert to fine art, but the practice of changing forms around a foundational concept applies here. Even though this dessert isn’t built in a tart pan, it remains crust and filling, and the pleasure we all need and deserve now.
Recipe: Big Chocolate Tart
By Genevieve Ko
For how elegant this looks and how complex it tastes, this dessert is incredibly easy to put together. Instead of a dense ganache filling, this one has a shiny top that hovers between the delicate softness of custard and the creaminess of pudding. The crisp-tender cocoa crust is pressed only into the bottom and forgoes the usual sides of a tart because it’s baked in a standard metal cake pan. Not only is this easier to pull off — no rolling sticky pastry or trying to unmold it after baking — it makes a tart big enough to feed a crowd. With a pure chocolate taste that’s great on its own, it also can be customized: simply sprinkle each piece with toppings of your choice.
Yield: One 9-by-13-inch tart
Total time: 1 hour, 35 minutes, plus cooling
Ingredients
For the Crust:
- 1 1/4 cups/163 grams all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup/100 grams sugar
- 1/4 cup/28 grams unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher or sea salt
- 10 tablespoons/140 grams cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
- 1 large egg yolk
For the Filling:
- 1 1/2 cups/357 grams heavy cream
- 3/4 teaspoon coarse kosher or sea salt
- 12 ounces/336 grams semisweet chocolate, chopped
- 3 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup/166 grams sweetened condensed milk
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- Flaky sea salt, thinly sliced candied orange peel, thinly sliced candied ginger, chopped pistachios or freeze-dried raspberries, or a combination, for garnish (optional)
Preparation
1. Prepare the crust: Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-by-13-inch metal cake pan, line the bottom and sides with foil or parchment paper, and grease again.
2. In a food processor, pulse the flour, sugar, cocoa and salt until evenly combined. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture resembles sand. Add the egg yolk and pulse until the crumbs look like very coarse sand, scraping the bowl as needed. (Or, use your fingertips or a pastry cutter to work the butter into the dry ingredients, then stir in the egg yolk with a fork.) Dump the crumbly dough into the pan, spread in an even layer and press firmly across the bottom.
3. Bake until visibly dry, about 20 minutes. When you press the top gently, it shouldn’t indent. Cool completely in the pan on a rack.
4. Prepare the filling: Reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees.
5. Heat the cream and salt in a large saucepan over medium, stirring occasionally, just until the cream bubbles at the edges. Turn off the heat and add the chocolate. Stir gently until smooth.
6. Add the eggs and stir until evenly blended, then stir in the condensed milk and vanilla until smooth. Pour into the cooled crust.
7. Bake until just set, 20 to 25 minutes. The very center should have the barest wiggle when you shake the pan.
8. Cool completely in the pan. When ready to serve, use the sides of the foil or parchment to slide the whole slab onto a large cutting board. Cut into squares or bars, wiping the knife between cuts for clean edges. Top with flaky salt, candied orange, candied ginger, pistachios or raspberries, or a combination.
Tips
The tart tastes best right after cooling, but it can be refrigerated for up to 5 days, cut or uncut, in an airtight container. Before serving, microwave for 5 or 10 seconds to restore shine to the top and softness to the center.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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