Christmas dessert

I like to cook ahead where I can, when I know there’ll be a lot of oven usage in a single day. So since tomorrow will be busy enough with making dinner, even just for two (E decided she wanted ham for dinner, I don’t do ham as previously discussed), it’s still a production. Mainly because I’m cooking and I like it that way!

So I did finally decide on dessert. I made a caramel-filled chocolate tart, only sadly I’m currently without a tart pan, so it ended in up a nice pie cake pan.

More pictures and recipe after the cut…

First off, my kitchen lighting is absolutely horrific, so my pictures completely suck. We’ve got old, tube florescent that are yellowed and pale and flicker and aside from giving me headaches, make picture-taking a chore in itself.

Anyway. The crust is pretty simple:

2.5 oz (1/2 c) whole wheat flour

2.5 oz (1/2 c) white flour

2 T sugar

1 stick cold butter, cut into small pieces

2 egg yolks

Mix flour and sugar together, add butter and mix (if you have a food processor, obviously this is easier to toss in and pulse) until resembling coarse meal. Add egg yolks until blended, press into a buttered tart pan (or cake pan if you’re like me and without at the moment). Bake in a 375 degree oven aprox. 20 min, until golden brown. Let cool, and make caramel.

To make the caramel:

1 c sugar

1/4 c water

1/4 c heavy cream

1/2 stick butter

1 vanilla bean

Combine sugar and water in a heavy pan over med heat until sugar dissolves, then bring to a boil and let sit, no stirring, occasionally swishing in the pan, until a deep amber colour (watch this carefully or you can end up with molasses in about 15 seconds if your burners heat strangely like mine do!). Remove from heat and pour in heavy cream. It’ll bubble and look really cool, stir it to combine, and then add butter. Stir until dissolved and smooth. Split vanilla bean and scrape seeds, add to caramel. Let cool aprox. 10 min, then pour over crust. Set aside for 45 min to cool; wait at least 30 min to start making the ganache.

I love the glassy look of sugar when it just starts to boil and is still clear.

This is one of my favourite looks. It’s like an abstract art piece, the way the cream spreads and bubbles over the sugar. It’s so pretty!

This picture sucks, but it looks so good, I could eat it right now, screw the chocolate.

Wait.

Did I just say that?? Something must be wrong! *laughs*

Okay, so it’s been about half an hour, time to make the ganache so it has time to cool.

1 c heavy cream

5 oz good chocolate, chopped (I used dark Ghirardelli’s)

In a heavy saucepan, bring cream to a simmer. Remove from heat, add chocolate, wisk until melted. Let cool aprox. 10 min, pour over caramel layer, chill to finish setting.

You ever want to just… dive into a vat of melted chocolate just for the hell of it?

Obviously, I didn’t cut it or anything yet, but I’ll grab pictures of that tomorrow night. It smells incredible and I am having to exercise insane amounts of willpower to not just go cut into it right this second.

But, I have bread to make, so that’ll distract me, hopefully!

I hope everyone who celebrates has an amazing and magical Christmas. And if you don’t celebrate, have a great day anyway!