Pear and Chocolate Charlotte

One of my favourite French desserts is a Charlotte, and I had a tin of pears which needed using and a recipe from a French neighbour for making a chocolate and pear one. It doesn't need cooking, just chilling.

I bought a Charlotte mould when living there, but you can use any deep cake tin.

It's simple to make and delicious.
Charlottes can also be made with bread.

You need:

a large packet of boudoir biscuits [sponge fingers] or make your own 

200ml cream

a sachet of vanilla sugar [about 1 tbspn]
large tin of pears in syrup
150g dark chocolate
4 egg yolks

Open can of pears and pour syrup into a small bowl and slice the pears. Dip the boudoir biscuits into the syrup and line a Charlotte mould with them, keeping some back for the top.

Using an electric hand beater, beat the cream and vanilla sugar together till it's thick.

Melt the chocolate over a low heat. Turn the heat off and add the egg yolks, beating together till the mixture cools. Add the cream and mix together.

Pour half this chocolate mixture into the mould over the biscuits and add half the sliced pears; cover with the rest of the chocolate mixture and finally top with a layer of the syrup-soaked boudoir biscuits.

Put in the fridge for 12 hours, then carefully unmould the Charlotte.

You can see that a Charlotte mould is curved, so made in an ordinary deep cake tin it won't look quite the same. You could use fruit to make a Charlotte - strawberry, raspberry, blackcurrant, gooseberry etc The biscuits I used were quite thick, as I bought them in France, but any thinner boudoir biscuits work just as well.

There are some great Charlotte recipes here

Lemon and Chocolate Tartlets

We had a good holiday in Brittany, and enjoyed lots of excellent food and wine. We ate in several creperies, enjoying the galettes made with buckwheat flour and filled with great things like prawns, cheese, ham and veg. We enjoyed some of the regions specialities such as Le Far Breton [ which is similar to the French Flan I posted about a while ago, but it has prunes and rum in it] and Kouign-amann, a butter cake made with yeast - very rich. We visited  couple of biscuit factories and sampled different flavoured palets and the galettes breton. My favourite flavour was the caramel and sea salt one. We also ate some gateau Breton, which is very similar in texture and flavour to the special cake from the Deux Sevres. I find them rather dry, but ok with a glass of cider!

I thought I'd post a French recipe to keep our holiday memories alive. It was given to me by my friend's neighbour; we were invited to her house for a meal, and this was the dessert. She also made a fantastic 'pain d'epices' using Moroccan spices, as her husband is Moroccan. She gave me that recipe too, and permission to use both recipes on my blog - lovely lady. Thank you C.
C bought the shortcrust pastry, but you could make your own, as I did, using your favourite recipe. I bought some candied lemons in a French delicatessen [as well as quite a few other goodies!]. The tartlets are little lemon ones topped with chocolate and cream. What's not to like?

You need shortcrust pastry using 250g of flour - I used 3 egg yolks, 50g of caster sugar and 150g of unsalted butter to make mine in the food processor. Put the ball of pastry in the fridge for about 30 mins then roll out to fit 6 tartlet tins x 10cm in diameter. Prick with a fork or add baking beans and bake blind in a preheated oven 200C/gas6  for 10 mins.

For the filling - beat 3 eggs with 200g of caster sugar and the finely grated zest and juice of 2 lemons. Add 100g of melted butter and beat together. Pour the filling into the pastry cases.
Reduce the heat of the oven to 180C/gas4 and bake the tartlets for 20 mins. Put on a wire rack to cool.

Bring 20cl of single cream to the boil and add 200g of dark chocolate broken into pieces - it's easier if you add them in 2 lots. Stir together. Pour onto the lemon tartlets when they're cold. Put in the fridge for an hour before using. Decorate the top with some candied lemon pieces.

Lemon and chocolate is a combination which I've not really tried before, but I like it. The ganache gives a lemon tart a luxurious finish.

Chocolate Oaties

My husband loves biscuits, so as it was pouring with rain and I felt like baking something, I decided to make some for him.
What to make? I had half a tin of Carnation caramel in the fridge left over from a cake recipe my daughter tried, so thought I'd use some of this - not much, as it's so sweet. I like a biscuit with a crunchy outside but a soft centre, so decided to use oats and some plain chocolate to get the sort of biscuit I wanted. A couple of tablespoons of caramel would give it extra flavour, and add to the softish centre.
I found plenty of oat biscuit recipes on the net, but couldn't find just what I wanted, so I used a basic oat recipe and added my own tweaks to it.

I made 15 chocolate oaties from this recipe.

Preheat oven 180C/gas4

100g butter, 100g soft brown sugar and 2 tbspns of Carnation caramel - spoon these into a pan and melt gently till all the sugar and butter have dissolved.
100g sr flour, 100g oats and 1/2 tspn of bicarbonate of soda - put these in a bowl and mix together then add to the butter mixture with 100g of plain chocolate broken into pieces. Beat well.
Grease 2 baking sheets [or use silicone sheets on baking trays] and spoon dessertspoonfuls of the oat mixture onto the trays, leaving space for them to spread. I put 8 on one tray and 7 on the other.
Bake for 15 mins, then leave the oaties on the trays for 5 mins to harden and put onto a wire rack.

We didn't wait long to try them with a cuppa and they were just right - crunchy and with the softer centre I like, and they have a great chocolate flavour.

I'll certainly make these again, but think I'll try them without the chocolate and add cranberries or sour cherries - there are lots of variations to try.

Chocolate Tart with Nougat

A very easy, quick dessert.
My younger daughter came yesterday. She is a chocaholic, so dessert had to be something chocolate. Recently I was given a bar of pistachio nougat so decided to use this with the tart, but any nougat would work as it's only the topping.

I made a sweet pastry using 200g of flour, 120g butter and 70g of caster sugar, binding it together with a beaten egg. Put in the fridge for 30 mins.

Preheat oven 190C/gas5 and grease a tart tin or flan dish.

Roll the pastry out to fit the tin/dish and bake blind in the oven for 20 mins. leave to cool.

Grate 200g of dark chocolate finely. Bring 20cl of single cream to the boil, take off the heat and add the chocolate. Carefully mix together and leave to cool. Spread it over the pastry case and smooth it out. Put in the fridge for about 20 mins. 

Chop up 100g of nougat and use it to sprinkle over the chocolate tart.

Sorry, am still having problems with my camera, so photo is a bit blurred! It's an easy basic chocolate tart to make, and it can have whatever topping you fancy - chopped up Mars bar, Maltesers, rosettes of double cream, little Easter eggs at Easter etc. -  the sky's the limit!

Chocolate and ginger cheesecake

We had some friends for a few days and it was G's birthday, so I wanted to make a nice dessert instead of a cake. He loves ginger, and I had a large jar of ginger confit bought on our last French trip. This could give the cheesecake a good ginger flavour, and be the decoration on the top. I read somewhere recently that ricotta makes a good cheesecake, so decided to use half ricotta and half my usual Philly. I used digestive biscuits, but could have used something with chocolate in them.

180g biscuits

250g ricotta

250g Philadelphia cheese

200g dark chocolate

2 eggs and 1 yolk

80g caster sugar

80g candied ginger and 50g for the decoration

60g butter

Icing sugar for top

Preheat oven 150C/gas2

You need a 23cm springform tin.

Blitz the biscuits in a food processor or bash them with a rolling pin.

Melt the butter and mix with the biscuits crumbs.

Use your fingers to press it into the base of the tin, then put in the fridge.

Melt the broken up chocolate in a microwave or over simmering water.

In a bowl beat together the ricotta, Philly, sugar, eggs and yolk. Add the melted chocolate and the chopped candied ginger and stir together.

Pour into the tin and bake for about an hour.

Let the cheesecake cool, then put it in the fridge overnight or for 12 hours.

Sprinkle some icing sugar over the top then decorate with the rest of the ginger, left in pieces this time and not chopped.

It had a really good ginger flavour, and I liked the mixture of the ricotta and Philly. Maybe another time I'll try half ricotta and half fromage frais.  The cheesecake had a nice smooth texture, and then the bit of crunchy ginger. I'll make the cheesecake recipe again without the ginger, and maybe use something else which is slightly crunchy, as I really liked the added texture to the smooth filling.

Marzipan cookies

These came about because I had a sort out in my baking cupboard and found some marzipan that needed using up.

 I remembered eating some biscuits in France that had a layer of marzipan in the middle, and they were delicious, so thought I'd have a try and make something similar. I used my usual cookie recipe, rolled out the dough and added a chunk of marzipan to the circles I'd cut out. To give an extra flavour I added a few bits of broken dark chocolate before putting another circle on top and sealing them together. I piped some white chocolate over when they were cold.

I made 12 complete cookies.

150g butter

150g light brown sugar

1 egg
250g flour

100g marzipan

100g dark chocolate, broken in small pieces

100g white chocolate

Preheat oven 190C/gas5

Line a baking sheet with some parchment paper.

Beat the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer, then beat in the egg. Fold in the

flour.

Roll the dough out on a floured surface to 1/2 cm thick, then using a 8 cm cutter, cut out 24 circles.

Put 12 circles on the baking sheet and add a chunk of marzipan and a few pieces of dark chocolate, then cover with another circle. Press the edges together so that the filling doesn't leak out. Bake for about 12 mins, then cool on a wire rack.

Melt the white chocolate carefully and spoon into an icing bag. Pipe lines on the cold cookies.

I loved them - loved the texture and the flavours of the marzipan and chocolate. The white chocolate decoration added a bit more glamour.

A question - are they cookies or biscuits - I don't really know what the difference is?

White chocolate parfait

We don't like Christmas pudding, so I try a new Christmas dessert recipe every year. Last year it was sticky toffee pudd. and this year I wanted to do something lighter. The recipe said that this amount would serve 8, but it served 3 people who had seconds! I made it in advance and froze it.

The recipe comes from this year's 'Woman's Weekly Christmas special'.

100g white chocolate broken up into pieces
250ml ready made vanilla custard
3 tbspns Baileys liqueur
142ml pot double cream
2 tbspns grated dark chocolate
a few raspberries

small loaf tin lined with cling film

Melt the chocolate and stir in the custard.
Leave to cool then stir in the Baileys.
Whip the cream then add it to the mixture.
Spoon it into the lined loaf tin and feeze overnight.
When it's solid, cover and wrap and label it.
Take it out and put it in the fridge 20 mins before you want to use it.
Put onto a plate, sprinkle the top with grated dark chocolate and decorate with a few raspberries.

Note: it melts quite quickly!