Book 14: Dinner at Matt's - Matt Moran

I love deserts, I may have mentioned  it before? Knowing me, a number of times.  I don't so much like the deserts themselves, if I made it myself, but i love the preparation and planning that goes into deserts.  At the moment I'm going through a snobby desert phase, which involves me scouring my recipe books to find something I've never cooked before but looks spectacular.  This sometimes ends badly, recently for my sister Kristy's birthday she asked for Creme Brulees.  I was in luck when she left it up to me to decide what sort of creme brulee to make.  On a side note if I ever ask you what you want for desert (or anything else) I've already got it in my head what I want to make, your opinion is not really required but as I'm fairly (not always) polite I'll ask for you thoughts, for future reference you response should be "I don't mind, you decide!".  Anyway back to the Creme Brulee, I decide on a spiced creme brulee and it was delicious!  The problem was the recipe called for the egg yolks to be whisked in a stand mixer, which is brilliant unless you forget they are mixing and come back to mega fluffy yolks (I'm easily distracted).  Not sound to up myself, but I rock at custards!  You know how you hear about custards splitting and going clotty?  Well that doesn't happen to me.. I'm the custard whisperer.  So, custard whisperer aside, I added the hot cream mixture to my fluffy yolks, confident that all was well.  The custard was smooth and silky, but is was also mega bubbly.  I didn't think much about it until the brulees all sank in their molds.  I cannot tell you how hard it is to brulee (melt sugar) whilst your custard catches on fire because of all the weird bubble mess on the sides.  To make a long, waffley, slightly incoherent story short, the Spicy Creme Brulees looked like gungy crud but tasted great.  Needless to say I'll never be able to make a good custard again after my 'custard whisperer" comment, it will be the damn Choux pastry all over again (see earlier blogs)... 

Recipe - Chocolate and Earl Gray Tea Tart

750ml pouring cream
5 Earl Grey tea tarts
50g good-quality dark chocolate
420g good-quality milk chocolate
50g unsalted butter, softened
good-quality cocoa powder, for dusting

Chocolate sponge
50g good-quality dark chocolate
5 egg yolks
100g caster sugar
1 1/2 tblsp good-quality cocoa powder
4 egg whites

Creme Chantilly
150ml cream
1 tblsp icing sugar
1 vanilla bean, seeds scraped and reserved pot set aside for another use

Firstly, make the chocolate sponge.  Preheat the oven to 190c and  lightly grease a 30cm x 40cm baking tray, then line with non-stick baking paper.
  Melt the 50g dark chocolate in a dry heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure that you don't let any water come into contact with the chocolate.  Once the chocolate has melted, transfer it to a mixing bowl and set aside to cool slightly.
  In a electric mixer, whisk the egg yolks with half the caster sugar until thick and pale.  Fold this in the melted chocolate, then fold in the cocoa.
  Whisk the egg whites in the electric mixer until soft peaks form, then gradually add the remaining sugar and whisk until stiff peaks form.  Gently fold this into the chocolate mixture until combined.  Spread the mixture evenly onto the prepared tray to a thickness of 1cm and top with another sheet of non-stick baking paper.  Bake for about 10 minutes or until the sponge is just cooked and springy to the touch.
  Meanwhile, bring the 750mls of cream to a simmer in a saucepan, then remove from the heat and add the tea bags, leaving to infuse while the cream cools to room temp.
  Lightly grease 23 cm x 24cm x 2.5cm depth lamington or swiss roll tin.
Remove the sponge from the oven and, when cool enough to handle, take a rolling pin and firmly roll it over the top sheet of non-stick baking paper.  This will flatten the sponge and make it denser (you want it about 3mm thick).  Remove and discard the top layer of non-stick baking paper and then trim the sponge to fit the prepared tin.  Pick up the ends of the bottom layer of non-stick baking paper and transfer the sponge to the tin - it should fit snugly.  Fold the excess non-stick baking paper over the sides of the tin.
  Melt the dark chocolate in a dry heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure that you don't let any water come into contact with the chocolate.  Once melted, brush the chocolate evenly over the sponge and place the tin in the fridge for about 10 minutes to set.
  Melt the milk chocolate in a dry heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water (don't get water in it).  Once melted, pour the chocolate into a bowl of a electric mixer, then pour over the infused cream, discarding the tea bags.  Mixing slowly, add the butter, a little at a time, and continue mixing until the chocolate cools, then pour this mixture evenly over a sponge and place the tin back in the fridge to set overnight.
  To make the creme chantilly, place the cream, icing sugar and vanilla seeds into a large bowl and whip until firm.
  Just prior to serving, remove the tart from the fridge, cut into rectangles about 6cm x 9cm and dust with a thick layer of cocoa powder.  Serve with a generous dollop of creme chantilly.

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This is an interesting book, it looks amazing and its got Matt Moran in it, which is never bad ( I like Matt Moran).  I got this book from the kids for Christmas and its very fancy.  It has all sorts of recipes in it that would be perfect if you had people coming for dinner and heaps of time on your hands.  Sadly I don't have heaps of time on my hands, I'm way to busy writing blogs and planning for zombie invasion (I'm kidding!).  But I do like this book, its fancy and nice to look at and has a fairly wide selection of recipes from meat, fish and deserts etc. 

The recipe itself is delicious, it may look like a lot of work but its fairly straight forward.  Next time I would tip the tea leave into the cream so it infuses better, you could hardly taste the tea at all.  But the tart was creamy and very tasty!  The layer of dark chocolate on the sponge added some delicious texture.  Normally I'm not a fan of chocolate deserts, I like chocolate not chocolate flavoured deserts (yes, i know it doesn't make sense), but considering the amount of chocolate in this its really nice...  But I would leave it over night in the fridge as it advises, I left mine in for about 6 hours and it was still really soft, edible but soft...

Thanks
Kate
xx

Oh, I'm sorry about the extra crappy photos this week, I've misplaced my camera so I'm using my phone.. never good..