No Bake Chocolate Tarts

This post is sponsored by Lizi’s Granola

A well made chocolate tart is a thing of beauty, elegant and perfect for a valentines day treat. Made with a silky smooth chocolate filling and a thin crisp pastry base, it’s a delicious classic dessert. But what if you don’t have the time to make pastry or a baked chocolate filling? You make these no bake chocolate tarts, of course. In the place of the pastry a no-bake tart crust is made, with Lizi’s Granola, which adds both ease and speed but also a whole load of texture which is just fabulous to eat. For this particular recipe I chose the Lizi’s Original Nuts and Seeds Granola as the texture it provides made for a great tart base and most importantly a delicious flavour. The filling is a simple ganache made with almond milk and brown sugar for a warm toasty note that goes great with the chocolate and granola.

As you’ll see from the ingredients the recipe is vegan and whilst you could make swaps and switch in dairy if you’re not vegan I would encourage you to try it as written anyway. For the crust I like to use virgin coconut oil which has the flavour of coconut and adds a great layer of flavour to the whole dish. For the ganache I use an almond milk that has a hint of bitter almonds that adds to the nutty complexion of the dish. Dairy has stronger flavours so using a something more subtle like almond milk allows the full flavour of the chocolate shine through in the ganache.

When making the ganache it is important that the chocolate mixture ends up incredibly smooth and silky and to that end there a couple of guidelines to follow to ensure the perfect end result. Chop your chocolate nice and fine, this way the milk doesn’t need to be as hot to melt big chunks of chocolate. Bring the milk to a steam or just to a simmer but do not let it boil. Firstly some plant based milks do not like being boiled and they can split if they become too hot but most importantly the chocolate wont appreciate the milk being too hot. Ganache is an emulsion and the heat from the milk can cause the cocoa butter to separate leading to a split ganache. Once you have properly heated the milk you want to pour to over the chocolate and set aside for a few minutes before stirring together. This pause allows the chocolate to melt and the milk to cool down slightly so that when stirred together it forms a silky emulsified texture and you get the best possible texture for your tarts filling.

Whilst these tarts are incredibly easy to make they do need a little refrigeration time to get everything set so they are perfect made for a dinner party, or half the recipe to make a date night dessert perfect for you valentine. 

Note: to get 15% off your next order of Lizi’s Granola use the code theboywhobakes15 on lizs.co.uk 

No Bake Granola Chocolate Tarts
Makes 4

Tart Crust 
175g Lizi’s Original Nuts and Seeds Granola
80g coconut oil, room temperature
Pinch of fine sea salt

Vegan Ganache
265g dark chocolate, finely chopped
50g light brown sugar
115ml almond milk* 

To make the crust place the about 2/3 of the granola into a food processor, with the blade attached, and process until fine and crumbly. Add in the remaining granola, the oil and salt and process until everything is evenly combined and the mixture is clumped together. Divide this mixture equally between four loose bottomed 10cm tart tins and press firmly into the base and up the sides of the tin. 

Place the tart cases in the fridge whilst you work on the ganache. 

Ganache is most commonly made with chocolate and cream but for a vegan ganache I typically turn to a water ganache, a simple mixture of water and chocolate. Because the water has no flavour of its own the flavour of the chocolate is pure and unadulterated so with this style ganache its best to use a chocolate you absolutely love. For this particular recipe I am using a kind of hallway house between cream and water, almond milk which (depending on the brand you use) can add a subtle almond flavour to the ganache.

Place the chocolate into a bowl and set aside. Add the almond milk and sugar to the pan and gently heat until just steaming then pour over the chocolate and set aside for a couple minutes before stirring with a whisk until a silky smooth ganache is formed.

Pour the ganache into the chilled tart cases and place into the fridge until the ganache has set, a couple hours. 

Serve with a little vegan whipped cream or sour cream if you're not vegan.

Kept refrigerated these will keep for 3-4 days.

*you can you use any plant based milk for this recipe but I like using an almond or coconut version as both have flavours that can compliment chocolate.

Black Cocoa Peanut Sandwich Cookies

These cookies are so ridiculously simple and so delicious. The cookie element is based around my melting moment recipe, a melt in the mouth, incredibly tender cookie. I use black cocoa but you can also use a regular dutched cocoa powder if thats what you have on hand. The balls of cookie dough are rolled in salted peanuts and pressed into flat discs and then baked. The filling is a simple white chocolate ganache mixed with peanut butter. Its the sort of cookie you want mid morning with a strong cup of coffee. 

Before we get to the recipe lets talk about cocoa powder for a second. Cocoa powder comes from the cocoa pods and specifically the beans inside those pods, so far so obvious. The beans are fermented and then dried. Generally they are then roasted (unless the product is destined to be used for ‘raw’ chocolate or cocoa powder but I wont be talking about that process here). The beans are then cracked open and the nibs are ground into what is called cocoa liquor and then, using a hydraulic press, the liquor is pressed under great pressure to extract most of the cocoa butter leaving behind a product known as a cocoa cake. This cake is dried once again and then ground into cocoa powder. 

Why then is there such a variety in cocoa powders, what is the difference between natural, dutched and black? Natural is the cocoa powder made as above with no additional processing, it is a light almost dusty brown colour and is bright and acidic in flavour. Dutched cocoa goes through an alkalisation process which lessens the acidity and makes a deeper richer tasting cocoa powder with a darker colour. In the UK and Europe this is traditionally the main type of cocoa powder available although natural and raw cocoa have become more popular over the last few years. Black cocoa, with its characteristic charcoal black colour, is a variation of dutched cocoa powder, the process of alkalisation taken to its limit to make an intensely dark and slightly bitter cocoa powder, if you’ve ever eaten an oreo you’ve had black cocoa. I like black cocoa for its colour and its flavour but its not suitable for everything, the flavour isn’t a pronounced chocolate flavour its much more roasted than that so if you want classic chocolate flavours I would a traditional dutched powder.

Whenever I use black cocoa I am always asked where to buy it as in the UK it is a relatively unknown product, at least until recently. I would always bring some home from the US when there on holiday or for work, King Arthur Baking sell my go-to version. Someone imports that brand into the UK but it is criminally expensive so I am thankful that a few new brands have sprung up to make it easier, and cheaper, to buy. Van Houten was the first brand more widely available, selling on Amazon, but I am yet to test this brand out. When I buy the cocoa myself I get it from De Zaan, a commercial cocoa powder producer that have recently started selling in a more direct to customer facing way. You can find there cocoa powder on Amazon and on from HB ingredients. 

Before we get to the recipe a brief note on peanut butter. When baking with peanut butter you need to be careful about what style you use. Generally you want to be using a commercial peanut butter and this is for the simple reason that it is less likely to split creating odd textures in the finished recipes. By all means you can use a natural peanut butter but be aware the result might not look like you envisioned or like the images of the recipe. 

Black Cocoa Peanut Melting Moments with Peanut Butter Ganache
Makes 15 Sandwich Cookies

Cocoa Melting Moments
250g unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
200g plain flour
60g black cocoa powder
85g icing sugar
30g cornflour
175g salted peanuts, roughly chopped

Peanut Butter Ganache
100ml double cream
125g white chocolate
75g smooth peanut butter 

Preheat the oven to 160ºC (140ºC Fan) and line a couple baking sheets with parchment paper.

For the cookies place the butter into a large bowl and use an electric mixer to beat until soft and creamy. Add the vanilla and beat briefly to combine. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, cocoa, icing sugar and cornflour. Add the flour mixture to thee butter mixture and mix on slow speed just until a dough is formed. 

Divide the dough into 20g portions and roll them into balls. Roll the balls in the chopped peanuts, your not looking to fully coat the balls just get a decent amount of peanuts on each cookie. Place the balls onto parchment lined baking trays leaving a little space between each cookie. Using a glass or measuring cup press each ball into a flat disc. Spraying the glass with a little oil can help prevent them sticking. 

Bake the cookies in the preheated oven for about 20-25 minutes or until the edges are set and dry.

Remove the trays from the oven and allow the cookies to cool fully. 

To make the ganache place the chocolate and cream into a small saucepan and place over low heat. Stir constantly, making sure to scrape the bottom of the pan to prevent anything from scorching, until the chocolate has melted. Pour the ganache into a small bowl and stir to make sure everything is combined. Set aside for 10 minutes before adding the peanut butter and using a small whisk to combine into the ganache. The ganache needs to be a little cool before adding the peanut butter as the heat can make the mixture split. Refrigerate the ganache until thickened enough to hold its shape but still spreadable, 60-90 minutes. Pipe or spread a small amount of ganache onto half of the cookies and sandwich together with a second cookie. Refrigerate for 30 minutes or until the ganache has fully set. 

Kept in a sealed container these will keep for 3-4 days.

Vegan Chocolate and Passion Fruit Tart

This post is sponsored by Gem Avocados

Making Vegan recipes is something I have been experimenting with a lot recently so when GEM® Avocados (exclusively available from Tesco) challenged me to use the fruit in a dessert I was totally game and got straight to baking. The first ever dessert I tried that included avocado was a chocolate mousse so I wanted to do a spin on that. The GEM Avocados are particularly buttery and creamy so I thought they would make for a silky smooth mousse and I was right, this ended up incredibly light, almost like a French Silk Chocolate Tart, very velvety. Vegan chocolate mousse is often made with Avocado, sweetener and cocoa powder and that makes more of a thick creamy mousse and I wanted to more accurately replicate the texture of the non-vegan version. To get that aerated texture I also folded through a little whipped aquafaba (the juice found in cans of beans, chickpeas being the most popular version) which replicates the traditional whipped eggs folded into a chocolate mousse.

For flavourings I went with a perennial favourite of mine, chocolate and passion fruit and paired those flavours with a speculoos crust, the warm toasty notes being a great match for the bright flavour of passion fruit and the rich flavour of chocolate. 

If you have never tried a dessert with Avocado before its worth trying, this is incredibly quick and easy to put together, the GEM Avocados are rich and buttery with a smoother texture than other varieties so it is a great choice for dessert.

Crust
250g speculoos biscuits
50g melted coconut oil
Large pinch fine sea salt

Chocolate Mousse Filling
100g dark chocolate, melted
4 tbsp maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
5 tbsp cocoa powder
1 1/5 GEM Avocados (about 250g of avocado)
1 tin chickpeas
2 tbsp caster sugar

Passion Fruit Topping
4 passion fruit
2 tbsp caster sugar
50ml water
Toasted coconut and cocoa nibs, to serve

To make the crust place the biscuits into the bowl of a food processor and pulse until finely ground. Pour in the coconut oil and salt and pulse until evenly combined. Pour the biscuit mixture into a 9 inch, loose bottomed, tart tin and press into the sides and base of the tin, compacting well. Refrigerate until needed. Clean the food processor bowl.

For the chocolate mousse, melt the chocolate and set aside to cool. Cut the GEM Avocados ion half, remove the stone and scoop out the flesh (you should have about 250g) and add to the food processor with the maple syrup, vanilla, cocoa powder and chocolate and process until smooth and creamy, 2-3 minutes. Meanwhile drain half of the liquid from the tin of chickpeas into a large bowl and using an electric mixer whisk until the aquafaba holds soft peaks. Add in the sugar and whisk for a couple minutes or until dissolved. Add about a third of the meringue mixture to the chocolate mixture and beat to combine. Add the remaining meringue in two additions, folding as lightly as you can to preserve the light texture. Scoop the finished mousse into the tart base and spread into an even layer. Refrigerate for at least four hours before serving. 

For the passion fruit topping scoop the pulp from the passion fruit into a small saucepan and add the sugar and water. Cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes or until reduced and slightly syrupy. Refrigerate until needed. 

To serve, drizzle the syrup over the tart and top with a sprinkling of toasted coconut flakes and a few cocoa nibs. 

Chocolate Tahini Babka Buns

The countdown is on, with only a few days left until One Tin Bakes is finally out in the world. After waiting well over a year my new book is finally published and to say I am excited is an understatement. I can’t wait for you guys to see it, to bake from it and to have it in your kitchens. Always the impatient baker, I couldn’t wait until publication to share a recipe from the book with you, so today I am sharing one of my favourites, the Chocolate Tahini Babka Buns. I am also telling you that the book is out NEXT THURSDAY and if you want it on the day there is still time to preorder, hint there is a link here.

Think of these buns as the meeting of cinnamon buns and babka with tahini thrown in for good measure. The story I tell in the book is how these were inspired after spending the afternoon in the kitchen with Uri Scheft, the baker who led the recent rise in popularity of babka, in the United States and around the world. The traditional babka, of Eastern European Jewish origin, is made with leftover challah dough rolled up with jam or cinnamon, It’s a world away from the babka that most people are making these days, it also lacks the adoration the modern version receives, it seems to have a love it or hate it quality, denser and drier than its modern counterpart. So, what changed the babka’s fortunes? Well, the answer seems to be simple…butter. Traditional Jewish breads would have been made with oil to keep them parve, but when non-jewish or non-parve chefs took on the babka in the early 2000’s they started making them with butter, the doughs became more brioche in style and the fillings became richer with more and more chocolate added. The one modern recipe that can fairly claim the crown, for pushing the babka into a wider public consciousness, is the one served at Breads Bakery in New York. The bakery was founded with Israeli baker Uri Scheft, of Lehamim Bakery (the partnership has since dissolved), and the babka that the bakery introduced to NYC became a true media darling, it was quite literally everywhere. Every magazine, every paper, every blog, it was a bread that went viral. And more importantly, it became the standard, the version that most people now think of when they think of babka, a swirled bread made with a brioche like dough and swirled with chocolate.

I was lucky to spend the afternoon in the kitchen with Scheft early last year where he taught me his famous babka recipe, as good as I remembered when I first tried in NYC. During that trip, where babka and tahini seemed to be two daily staples, the idea of sneaking in a little tahini into a chocolate babka seemed like an obvious one. On arriving back home I tried out the idea immediately, before my bags were even unpacked, with the memory or Uri’s version still fresh in my mind. I knew immediately it was a good thing, have a second slice good. The version I am finally posting is the one I made for One Tin Bakes, adapting the idea to the form of cinnamon buns which made the recipe 9x13 friendly. If you don’t follow me online elsewhere or you have managed to miss my last few posts let me briefly explain the book. The idea is that every single recipe is baked in the same 9x13 tin (its a classic brownie tin) making the required equipment so much lower than most baking books, hopefully making it more approachable. The recipes run the gamut in terms of style, required skill, and time required to bake them. There is something for everyone and no matter whether lockdown has got you baking for the first time or you’ve baking since you were a kid you’ll find something you will love. 

COMPETITON TIME

Before we get to the recipe I have one last thing to tell you, its competition time! To celebrate the release of the book I have partnered with Nordicware, Guittard Chocolate and Belazu to create a brilliant prize package. The prize is a signed copy of the book, a One Tin Bakes tote bag, the Nordicware 9x13 tin I recommend in the book plus one of their iconic bundt pans, a whopping 3kg bag of Guittard Chocolate (they’re providing a bag of one of my favourites) and belazu are proving a selection of their tahinis (classic and their new black tahini) and oils. To enter the competition all you have to do is make one of the recipes from the book and post a picture on instagram saying that it came from my new book One Tin Bakes and tagging me using the hashtag #OneTinBakes. Obviously the book comes out halfway through the window for this competition so feel free to make these babka buns or get yourself a copy of the June issue of Olive magazine which has a bunch of other recipes from the book. Competition is only open to UK residents and the winner will be picked at random. 

Chocolate Tahini Babka Buns
Taken From my book One Tin Bakes (Kyle Books 2020)
Makes 12 

Brioche Dough
500g strong white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
25g caster sugar
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
7g fast-action dried yeast
250ml whole milk
2 large eggs
100g unsalted butter, at room temperature, diced, plus extra for greasing 

Chocolate Tahini Filling
100g dark chocolate (65–70% cocoa solids), finely chopped
100g unsalted butter, diced
55g light brown sugar
100g tahini
flaked sea salt, for sprinkling 

Vanilla Syrup
65g caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons sesame seeds 

For the bread dough add the flour, sugar, salt and yeast to the bowl of an electric stand mixer with the dough hook attachment and mix briefly to combine. Add the milk and eggs and knead on medium-low speed for about 10 minutes, or until the dough is smooth, elastic and pulling away from the sides of the bowl. With the mixer still running, add the butter, a little bit at a time. Once the butter has been worked into the dough, continue kneading for a further 10 minutes or so until the dough is once again pulling away from the sides of the bowl. Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover with clingfilm and refrigerate overnight or for up to 2 days. If you prefer, you can let the dough rise at room temperature, but it’s worth making this in advance as the dough is much easier to handle when thoroughly chilled.

The next day, lightly grease or line the base of the 9x13 baking tin with a piece of parchment paper. Make the filling. Place the chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water (ensuring the bottom of the bowl doesn’t touch the water underneath) until melted. Remove from the heat, stir in the brown sugar and tahini, then set aside. 

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and, working on a lightly floured surface, roll out into a large 50 x 50cm (20 x 20in) square. Spread the chocolate tahini mixture evenly over the dough. At this point, the tahini mixture will be loose and glossy, so if you attempt to roll the dough up now it will be very messy, therefore, allow the mixture to sit for a couple of minutes until it goes a little tackier and loses its shine (don’t leave this too long though, because the filling will eventually set, meaning it won’t stick to the dough when it’s rolled). Sprinkle over a little flaked sea salt and roll up the dough into a tight sausage. 

Cut the sausage into 12 equal-sized slices and place them, cut-side up, into the prepared baking tin. Cover with clingfilm and set aside to prove in a warm place for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until the rolls are touching each other and feel puffy to the touch. 

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 190°C (375°F), Gas Mark 5. Bake the buns for 30–35 minutes, or until golden brown. 

Meanwhile, make the syrup. Place the caster (superfine) sugar and 60ml (1⁄4cup) water in a small saucepan and cook over a low heat just until the sugar has dissolved. Remove from the heat and add the vanilla. 

When the buns come out of the oven, while still hot, liberally brush them with the syrup and then sprinkle over the sesame seeds. Leave the buns to cool completely in the tin before removing and serving. 

Stored covered, these buns will keep for 2–3 days.