tart Archives | FoodFash

When my Amazon book order arrived, I immediately started flipping through pages and flagging recipes. One of the recipes I flagged was the blackberry curd tart with lemon crème fraîche from In The Sweet Kitchen. Not only did this recipe sound like a dessert I’d order at one of my favorite fancy restaurants, it also sounded like a challenge trifecta.

And the fact that Driscoll’s Berries had just sent me a stack of coupons for their berries made the timing of making this recipe nothing short of perfect. Side note: a Driscoll’s Berries coupon will make the Whole Foods cashier super jealous (this has happened twice now).

After a good bit of pureeing, straining, and whisking, it came to my attention that this recipe wasn’t going to be as difficult as I initially thought. And then I read the wait times for each component… 2 hours, 4 hours, 24 HOURS! It was then I realized that the biggest challenge of #bakingbootcamp is not going to be skill or technique, rather it will be time and patience. Perhaps I should have asked Santa for more patience for Christmas.

The end result was the most pro dessert I’ve ever made. The pâte sucrée (pastry) that the recipe described as “fussy, difficult to work with and sensitive” came out buttery, crisp and ready for filling. The blackberry curd was light, fresh, and slightly sweet. And the crème fraîche, the darling crème fraîche that I patiently watched for 24 hours, was delicious in an unfair way. Combining these three mini perfections together produced a dessert package worthy of eating after your finest meal.

In all honesty, I started the morning thinking the most exciting thing about V-day 2011 was going to be the submission of my itemized taxes. Then I thought to myself, if Terry Walters (my foodie hero) has an easy chocolatey, Valentines appropriate dessert, I’ll allow myself to get in the holiday spirit.

It doesn’t get much more Valentines than ‘Chocolate Lover’s Tart’.

I read down the list of ingredients and determined I had enough like ingredients in my pantry for this to be a pretty cheap treat.

Gluten-free all purpose flour instead of brown rice flour, olive oil instead of canola oil, and peanut butter instead of cashew butter. I also had cocoa powder, pure maple syrup, and vanilla on hand.

The only items left to purchase? Tofu and pecans.

This recipe tops the list of most simple baked goods ever created in my kitchen.

And I bought this handy dandy tart form at Ikea for $7.99!

I knew it would be good because I couldn’t stop eating the tofu batter while the pecan crust was in the oven. But… I waited til I arrived at Val’s house to test it out the finished product. O-M-Geee! So much chocolatey goodness! This will be my go-to guest dessert for parties from this point forward.

Side note: If you use gluten-free vanilla extract, you can add this recipe to your gluten-free recipe collection.