Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries, a stunning dessert that combines a buttery crumbly chocolate pate sucrée, a luxurious vanilla bean pastry cream, and fresh sweet strawberries. A forkful and you'll be in dessert heaven!
Song of the day: I Don’t Like It, I Love It - Flo Rida feat. Robin Thicke & Verdine White
Tart love
When it comes to baking, tarts have a special place in my heart. I not only love to bake them, they are also the dessert I enjoy the most.
Tarts, after the first crumbly bite, they just melt in your mouth. They are also versatile, like the Italian crostata. You can fill them with jam, with ricotta, with chocolate, or top with fruit.
Chocolate tart
Chocolate tarts are even better: the cocoa in the crust adds richness while bringing decadence into the picture.The chocolate pate sucrée I used in this Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries is my go-to recipe from the Duchess Bake Shop Cookbook. It never fails me and it makes the best tart shell.
The crust is blind baked, that means you bake it without the filling. I simply poke the bottom of the crust with a fork, but another method is to place pie weights or dried beans on top.
To bake it, I used a tart pan with a removable bottom; it makes it easy to shape the dough in the pan and to remove the crust once it's baked.
With this recipe for the pate sucrée, you will end up with enough dough for 2 x 8-inch tarts. Bake one now and freeze the other one for a later use. It will come handy when you want to make another tart and it will cut the time by more than half.
Pastry cream
The vanilla bean pastry cream is my Italian family recipe. It is made of milk, egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch (or flour), and vanilla bean. TIP: If you have leftover pastry cream, make a simple spoon dessert by adding fresh berries on top: light, fresh, delicious.
Fruit topping
For the topping, I chose strawberries. They are in season right now, and they compliment the cocoa crust and the pastry cream immensely. Moreover, they make for a stunning presentation, don't you think? You can use whatever fruit is in season or you like best, even mixed fruit.
I had a lot of fun making this Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries and the whole preparation kept me busy for some time. The end result was so rewarding! Beautiful to look at, and even better when we got to taste it!
Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries
In the end, the crust has this delicate crispness to it and when it hits your tongue it just melts in your mouth, leaving your tongue with a buttery richness on it. The pastry cream comes in like silk and lusciously blends with the crust, especially those fresh vanilla bean bits that make your mouth sing. The strawberries nicely macerated offer the juicy freshness to cleanse the palate and you are ready for the second, third, fourth bite.
Serving suggestions
This Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries is best served fresh. Keep leftovers in the fridge for 2-3 days. As the days pass, the moisture of the pastry cream, along with the condensation of the fridge, takes away from the lovely crumbly texture of this most exquisite dessert.
Happy baking!
Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries
Chocolate Tart with Pastry Cream and Strawberries, a stunning dessert that combines a buttery crumbly chocolate pate sucrée, a luxurious vanilla bean pastry cream, and fresh sweet strawberries. A forkful and you'll be in dessert heaven!
- Total Time: 1 hour 3 minutes
- Yield: 10 servings 1x
Ingredients
Chocolate Pate Sucrée (makes 2 x 8" tarts):
- 245 g (1 ½ cups) flour 00, or all-purpose flour
- 100 g (¾ cup + 1 Tbsp) icing sugar
- 18 g (3 Tbsp) unsweetened cocoa powder
- 2 g (¼ tsp) salt
- 175 g (¾ cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1 large egg, organic, free range
- ¼ tsp pure vanilla extract
Vanilla Bean Pastry Cream:
- 4 egg yolks, organic, free-range
- 140 g granulated sugar
- 45 g corn starch, sifted
- 500 ml whole milk or half and half cream (or part milk, part cream)
- 1 vanilla bean
Strawberries:
- 1 cup strawberries
- 1 Tbsp sugar
- 1 Tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice (or fruit juice of your choice)
Instructions
Chocolate Pate Sucrée:
- Sift the flour, icing sugar, cocoa powder, and salt together into the bowl of a stand mixer.
- Add the butter and mix on low speed until the mixture looks sandy.
- Add the egg and vanilla and continue to mix on low, stopping when the dough is barely mixed and some of the dry ingredients are still visible.
- Empty the dough onto a wood board (or counter) and press it down with the palm of your hands to work in the last of the dry ingredients.
- Shape the dough into two flat rectangles, wrap them in plastic and set in the refrigerator for 2-3 hours or overnight. You can also double wrap one pastry dough and freeze it for a later use (up to 2 months).
- Remove the pate sucrée from the refrigerator and wait a couple minutes so that it is not too hard to roll. Lightly flour a work surface and both sides of the dough.
- Roll out the dough to about ½ cm thick, making sure it is not sticking to the work surface, and giving the dough a 90 degree turn after each roll, flipping it over and adding flour as needed. As the dough gets thinner it is more delicate and flipping it over will be more difficult. Just keep rotating it and lightly flouring as you roll.
- Roll your dough on the rolling pin and gently place it over the tart pan with removable bottom, pressing the dough delicately at the bottom and edges of the pan. With a sharp knife trim the excess dough on the edges.
- Using a fork, lightly poke holes in the bottom of the shell so that no air bubbles form while baking.
- Refrigerate the shell for at least 15 minutes before baking.
- In the meantime, preheat the oven to 375° F (190° C).
- For an 8-inch tart pan, bake for 18 minutes, (you will see the edges of the tart separating from the sides of the pan).
- Take out of oven and let cool on a rack, while you make the pastry cream.
Vanilla Bean Pastry Cream:
- Add the cream (or milk and cream) in a pot with a heavy bottom.
- Cut the vanilla bean lengthwise and extract the seeds with the tip of a knife. Add the pod to the pot with the milk/cream (the seeds you will add to the sugar in the next step).
- Bring the pot to a low boil over medium/low heat, then remove from the heat.
- In a small bowl add the sugar and the seeds of the vanilla bean and massage to infuse the sugar with the vanilla essence.
- In a medium bowl add the yolks, and the vanilla sugar. Whisk well but quickly (if you leave the sugar in contact with the yolks for too long, it will crystallize the proteins making them insoluble).
- Add the sifted corn starch (or flour) and mix well.
- Remove the vanilla bean pod from the milk/cream. Add two ladles of milk to the egg mixture to temper and dilute it a bit, mix, then pour the mixture back into the pot with the remnant milk/cream and bring it back to the stove on low heat.
- Let it thicken by whisking continuously.
- Immediately remove the cream from the heat and pour it into a bowl immersed in a larger bowl filled with ice cold water, while stirring constantly. The intent is to cool the cream quickly by bringing the temperature down.
- Cover the cream with plastic, letting the plastic touch the cream to avoid from drying out.
- Let cool at room temperature, then refrigerate. At this point the pastry cream is ready for use.
Assembly:
- Wash and thinly cut the strawberries. Macerate them for a few minutes in sugar and lemon juice (or fruit juice).
- Take the pastry cream out of the refrigerator and stir.
- Pour few tablespoons of cream on top of the tart and spread with a small offset spatula.
- Arrange the strawberries on top as you most like, and sprinkle with icing sugar (optional).
Notes
With this recipe for the pate sucrée, you will have enough dough for 2 x 8-inch tarts. Bake one now and freeze the other dough well wrapped in plastic for a later use. You could also bake one tart in a 9" tart pan.
Leftover pastry cream keeps in the fridge for 2-3 days. We had the leftover pastry cream topped with some berries for a gluten-free, light dessert.
- Prep Time: 45 minutes
- Cook Time: 18 minutes
- Category: Dessert, tarts
- Method: Baking
Keywords: strawberries, dessert, butter, chocolate, tart, pastry cream, eggs, cocoa
I love baking and kneading dough because it takes me to a happy place in my soul.
Ivana says
Che delizia! E poi è anche bellissima da vedere!
Ivana, è veramente una bontà! Poi, anche l'occhio vuole la sua parte 😉 . Appena ho tempo metto anche la ricetta in Italiano. Ne vale la pena. Grazie mille per essere passata di nuovo a trovarci! 🙂
Ivana says
Grazie Nicoletta! Comunque dovrei riuscire a capire tutto anche in inglese!
Milena | Craft Beering says
Beautiful tart Nicoletta! Great tip for saving half of the pate sucrée for another day. And I love your recipe for the vanilla bean pastry cream -I think I could eat it with fruit every day.
Thanks so much, Milena! Having the shell ready to bake is a life savior with these kind of "elaborated" desserts. As for the pastry cream, hope you try, it is amazing!
Dawn @ Girl Heart Food says
I bet that tart by itself is amazing!! You can't beat the combination of strawberries and chocolate. This one looks so gorgeous and just reminds me of summer (though, we actually have snow here today!!!). I wouldn't have any hesitation eating this one if it were placed in front of me, either! Pinning! Hope you're having a great weekend 🙂
This tart is amazing, Dawn! Hope we could share some with you. Would really love to live closer 🙂 . Thank you so much for the comment and the pin!
Beyond the Chicken Coop says
What a lovely tart and how fun to take a cooking class! My family would be ecstatic if I brought home such lovely tarts! They would send me off to cooking class every week! I love the fresh strawberries on this tart!
The baking class was awesome! I already loved making tarts and now I feel I am more confident. The fresh strawberries were just the right touch. Thank you for your comment!
annie@ciaochowbambina says
That's just a plate full of happiness! Chocolate and strawberries were born to be together! Thank you for sharing!
Thank you, Annie, and you're welcome! It was so good, also very pretty ????.
acanadianfoodie says
This is the recipe I stopped by for! I love making French Tarts myself and as I grow rasperries, have make a few really gorgeous raspberry ones, and a few years ago, developed a Saskatoon Berry Tart for the summer that is spectacular. This one I know is so delicious as I got to try it. LUCKY ME! So, now, I have the recipe! I have made a tart au chocolat which is divine, but never the chocolate pate sucree. Really looking forward to making this in Strawberry Season this July!
Hugs, Valerie
Oh, thanks, Valerie, you make me blush! Now I want to make a raspberry one and a Saskatoon berry one! I just love tarts ????. So happy you're going to make the chocolate pate sucree and I hope you make the pastry cream as well, it is too good!
Elaine says
What a fantastic tart! Something I definitely want to make in the near future. Thank you for your recipe - now I don't have to spend a lot of time searching for the perfect one 😉
Thank you so much, Elaine! I love this tart, hope you try it and let me know!
Savita says
How gorgeous the tart looks, loved it totally. This is on my cook list for this weekend.
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Luke says
A perfect dessert recipe for the jubilee celebrations, thanks for sharing 🙂
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Ann says
Wow, this dessert does look stunning! I think I am more excited to eat it than make it! Thanks for the share!
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