Salted Caramel & Nutella Chocolate Tarts

I finally assembled these chocolate tarts, after a few breaks in between preparing the different parts. It was quite a long process for me. It started with the salted caramel sauce which I made last Tuesday. Then on Friday, I made & baked the tart shells. The weekend was a busy one for me, so I kept the baked shells in the fridge & only managed to prepare the Nutella ganache & assemble the tarts on Monday morning.

The inspiration to bake these tarts came after I tasted the Nutella tart my daughter bought from a local cafe last week. I wanted to try a new recipe, so I flipped through Vincent Gadan's Homemade Pâtisserie, Pastry Made Easy & the chocolate & salted caramel tart caught my eye. 

Preparing the tart shells took longer than expected, thanks to the hot & humid weather here. My kitchen is not air-conditioned & I didn't want to do the rolling & cutting of the dough in my bedroom, so  the dough had to go into & out of the fridge a few times as it got soft & sticky rather fast. At the same time, I was also making another all-butter pastry, the one that required a lot of foldings, for another tart. And before starting with the chocolate dough, I also made a cheesecake for my son's birthday...  So, you can imagine how busy I was that day...

But all the effort & time spent making these delicious tarts really paid off! Salted caramel & chocolate make an amazing combination! The sweet caramel really balances off nicely with the rich bittersweet chocolate flavour from the ganache & melt-in-the-mouth sable. The hazelnut flavour from the Nutella & chopped nuts (which also gave great texture & crunch) seals off this must-try dessert. Just be sure to use good quality cocoa powder & chocolate for a truly luxurious French dessert.

Salted Caramel & Nutella Chocolate Tarts

Ingredients:

Chocolate Sable Dough
175g all-purpose/plain flour
5g almond meal
15g Dutch cocoa powder (I used Valrhona.)
110g unsalted butter, 1.5cm cubes, cold
2 pinches table salt
4g baking powder
75g pure confectioners' / icing sugar, sifted
1 egg (50-55g)
butter for greasing
flour for dusting

Salted Caramel Sauce
1/2 recipe (room temperature)

Nutella Ganache

100g dark chocolate pieces (I used Valrhona Equatoriale 55%.)
40g nutella (I'll add more the next time.)
125ml heavy cream (I used dairy whip cream.)
whole hazelnuts (toasted & chopped) - for topping

Method:

For the chocolate sable dough:

1. Place the flour, almond meal and cold butter into a mixing bowl and rub the ingredients between your hands until it forms a sandy texture. This should take a few minutes.
2. Add the salt, baking powder, sugar and whole eggs, then mix with one hand to make a dough ball. Mix for two minutes until all combined.
3. Flatted the dough into a rectangle. Wrap the dough in cling film and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes before using.
4. Prepare four 10x2.5cm fluted tart moulds by brushing the inside with softened butter, dust with flour and shake off any excess—this will ensure the dough doesn’t stick to the mould after baking.
5. Lightly flour a clean surface and, using a rolling pin, roll the dough to a 5 millimetre thickness. Cut out 4 circles of dough using a round cutter with a 13cm diameter. Place a circle over a tart mould & press in the dough lightly with your fingers, from the centre, around the base & then up the sides. Take the rolling pin and roll over the top of the mould - this will cut the top edges, giving you a clean finish. Repeat with the rest of the dough. Rest the dough in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.
6. Preheat the oven to 170ºC/gas mark 3. Line the tart base with parchment and baking beans. Bake for about 10 to 15 minutes. (I baked mine for 25 minutes.) Allow to cool.

For the Nutella ganache:

In double boiler, combine cream and chocolate pieces, stirring constantly until dissolved and smooth. Remove from heat and stir in Nutella. Set aside.

To assemble tarts:

1. Spoon 1-2 tsp (depending on the size of the tart moulds) salted caramel sauce into the pre-baked tart base.
2. Then pour or spoon the Nutella ganache onto the caramel sauce. Garnish with chopped toasted hazelnuts.

Notes & modifications:

1. Because of the hot weather, I made sure my butter & flour were cold before mixing. I kept my chopped butter in the freezer & the flour in the fridge before starting to mix. I used a food processor to mix my dough. It's faster than doing it with the hands, thus preventing the butter from melting in the process.
2. I used two 10-cm heart shape, eight 8-cm round & three 6-cm round tart pans to use up all the dough.
3. The baked tart is quite fragile, so you need to handle it very carefully when assembling the tarts. To reduce breakages, I chilled the shells first as cold tart shells are not as fragile.

Chocolate Sable Dough recipe is by Vincent Gadan & Michelle Guberina from Homemade Pâtisserie, Pastry Made Easy.

I'm linking this post to Cook-Your-Books event no. 16 hosted by Kitchen Flavours.
I'm also linking this post to the Best Recipes for Everyone, September Event : Chocolate Wonderland, hostedby XuanHom's Mom Kitchen Diary.

Lapis Nutella Cake

Let me start this entry by wishing all my Muslim readers Eid Mubarak & Selamat Hari Raya Idul Fitri. How was your celebration so far? Hope it has gone well.... Alhamdulillah, mine has been good so far. We only went visiting on the first day since that was the only public/school holiday. So the visiting will have to continue this weekend.

Tonight's sharing will be the recipe for the Nutella Lapis which I made for the two mothers. As I've mentioned before, I usually prefer to bake 2 lapis cakes together, so I decided to bake the same cake for my mum & mum-in-law. 

I don't think you would be wondering if this cake tasted good.... it's Nutella cake! It can't go wrong, right? Besides, there're condensed milk & Horlicks too, & from my experience, any cakes that have any of these three ingredients will not disappoint me. However, this cake did take up more than the usual time to finish baking. It took me 2 & a half hours to complete baking the two cakes, almost an hour more than baking other types of lapis cakes. So you do need more patience if you wish to bake this Nutella lapis cake.

Lapis Nutella
(Makes 1 cake.)

Ingredients:
500 gm butter
180 gm caster sugar
1tsp ovelette
1 tsp vanilla paste (I added.)

10 eggs (large)
1 tin (397gm) sweetened condensed milk

260 gm Hong Kong flour (I used cake flour.)
100 gm Horlicks powder (malted milk powder)
220 gm Nutella spread

180 – 200gm Nutella spread (to top the Nutella layers)

Method:

1. Preheat oven (grill or top heat only) at about 180 deg C. (Refer to my post here for more tips on baking lapis cakes.)
2. Grease & line the bottom of a baking pan. (10x7 inch or 8x8 inch.) 
3. Combine butter, sugar & ovelette in a mixing bowl & cream until fluffy, about 10 minutes.
4. Add in eggs, one at a time, & continue mixing until well blended.
5. Reduce the speed of beater & add in condensed milk, continue mixing.
6. Reduce speed to the lowest possible & add in flour & Horlicks in 3 parts. Mix until well blended.
7. Divide batter into 2 parts. Leave 1 part  plain & add Nutella to the other part.  (I weighed 1 part 220g lesser than the other & added Nutella to the lighter part. In this way, I would not end up with too much excess Nutella batter.)
8. Pour 90g of plain batter into baking pan. Spread  the batter evenly & bake for about 3-5 minutes or until the layer turns golden brown. Remove the pan & press the layer with a lapis cake presser to even out the layer & pop any bubbles. 

   

   .... a lapis presser.

9. Next, pour 90g of Nutella batter & spread it out. Then spoon Nutella spread onto the batter (as shown in the above picture). Bake until cooked. 
10. Continue with plain & then Nutella batter, until finish.
11. When finished, turn the cake onto a wire rack & leave to cool before slicing & serving.

Recipe by Rozzan.

I'm linking this post to the Little Thumbs Up  August (flour) event,  organised by Bake for Happy Kids and My Little Favourite DIY  and hosted by Diana from Domestic Goddess Wannabe.

Lucky Hoof Roll a.k.a Roll Tapak Kuda

Wishing all Muslim readers Eid Mubarak. Hope you had a blessed & great time with your loved ones. Today, I'm sharing a recipe of an all-time favourite roll cake... so I realised.. I made Lucky Hoof Roll or Roll Tapak Kuda for my mum & she reported that it was so popular with the guests that it had to be replenished, again & again & again.....

Although I learnt to make this roll from Mdm Aini Salim many years ago, I think I've never made it for Hari Raya before. My sis, who is also my used-to-be hari raya  co-baker, asked how come she's not aware of the existence of such cake! Well, the only reason I decided to make this was because I thought it would be easier than making the colourful African Mambo Roll which I normally made for my mum every year. I was right, it's easier to make this roll & is as popular, if not more popular than the regular roll cake. I'd probably be baking this from this year onwards!

Lucky Hoof Roll (Roll Tapak Kuda)
Recipe by Aini Salim.

Ingredients:
10 egg yolk
5 egg white
225g caster sugar
30g ovalette (cake stabilizer)
*110g plain flour or top flour
*1/2 tsp baking powder (I used double-acting.)
135g butter (melted)
*10g milk powder or vanilla ice-cream powder
(* sifted together)
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tsp chocolate emulco
Nutella chocolate spread OR hazelnut paste OR Nutella chocolate filling (recipe follows)
** I used Nutella chocolate filling.

Method:

1. Prepare baking pans. Line & grease pans. Set aside.
2. In a mixing bowl, combine egg yolk, egg white, sugar & ovalette & beat until thick & fluffy. Add in flour & continue beating until well mixed.
3. Add in melted butter & vanilla & mix well.
4. Scoop up 5 big spoons of batter into a bowl & mix it with the chocolate emulco. Then pour into baking pans (Refer below for dimensions of pans.). Spread batter evenly.
5. Fill the rest of plain batter into a piping bag. Pipe batter onto chocolate layer. (I did not use  piping bag, just spooned batter.)
6. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 180 deg C. Once cooked, remove pan from oven. Then remove cake from pan & leave to cool.
7. Once cooled, cut off the edges of the cake. Then cut into 2 or 3, depending on the size of the pans. Spread Nutella / hazelnut paste / chocolate filling on the cake & fold into two. Wrap rolled cakes with grease paper or cling wrap & chill cakes before serving.

Dimension & number of pans used as suggested by Mdm Aini Salim:
1. two 10x10-inch pans - cut each pan of cake into 2, so total rolls yielded is 4, or
2. two 12x10-inch pans - cut each pan of cake into 3, so total rolls yielded is 6, or
3. four 9x9-inch pans - cut each pan of cake into 2, so total rolls yielded is 8.
*** I  used option 1.

Chocolate filling:
200g  Mohrenglane / Tulip / Selbourne chocolate
1/2 cup (125g) butter (melted)
1 bottle (400g) Nutella

Melt chocolate using double boiler. Add in melted butter & Nutella & mix thoroughly. Set aside to cool & thicken it before spreading onto cakes. ( I placed the filling in the fridge for few minutes so that it will thicken, but don't leave it there too long or it will harden.)

I am submitting this post to the Little Thumbs Up "Egg" event organised by Bake for Happy Kids, my little favourite DIY and hosted by Baby Sumo of Eat Your Heart Out. Take a look at other egg recipes here.

Ferrero Rocher Brownies

My friend had a craving for this Ferrero Rocher Brownies. She liked it after tasting it when I first shared it with my colleagues a few months ago. I first baked this brownies after seeing Jamie's of My Baking Addiction post but didn't manage to take any pictures, hence no entry for this yummy dessert until now.

                              

This is one expensive brownies. Just the ingredients cost me $20! And that doesn't include the Nutella used for the frosting, which I decided to omit. But it's worth it because the taste is just amazing. The ingredients were costly mainly becauseI used the ones imported from Europe: Belgium butter, French chocolate & Italian rocher! It's all about quality ingredients.... Since I omitted the Nutella frosting, I call this brownies Ferrero Rocher Brownies instead of  Nutella Brownies.

Ferrero Rocher Brownies

Recipe by My Baking Addiction.

Ingredients:

4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used Valrhona Equatoriale 55%)
3/4 cup unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup all-purpose flour
12 Ferrero Rocher candies, sliced in half

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 deg C). Line an 8×8 inch baking pan with foil and spray with nonstick cooking spray.
2.  Microwave chocolate and butter in a large bowl microwave-safe bowl at medium (50% power) for 3-4 minutes or until butter is melted.
3. Stir until chocolate is melted. Whisk in sugar, eggs, vanilla and salt. Gradually add in flour; stir until just combined.
4. Spread 1/2 the batter into prepared pan. Add an even layer of Ferrero Rocher candies and cover with remaining 1/2 of brownie batter. Bake for 30-35 minutes; do not over bake.
5. Remove from pan & transfer to cooling rack to cool completely.