Dark chocolate strawberry topped tart

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Okay, you really should stop whatever you are working on and make this Dark chocolate strawberry topped tart. Y’all it is good enough to set aside your current plans and focus on this. The dark chocolate plus strawberries are the stuff dreams are made of, especially mine. Well, and my youngest son, older son and husband.

Pate sucree-

Start with a base of chocolate pate sucree. Sounds fancy? Not really, it is a sweetened pie crust. I made mine in my food processor and it came together in under 5 minutes. It is that simple.

Start by adding the dry ingredients to the food processor. Pulse a few times to combine. I like to use powdered sugar as the sweetener, it gives a more flaky crust. If you prefer, granulated sugar works as well. I love Hershey’s dark cocoa for my cocoa in this recipe.

Just like a pie crust, you want to make sure everything stays chilled, ESPECIALLY the butter. This will stay chilled until you add it to the warm oven, then it cooks, releases steam and creates layers in your dough.

Once the butter is pulsed, the last step is adding in the egg, which has already been beaten. Turn on the food processor and add the egg through the hole. It should only take just a few seconds to combine.

Here is the finished dough with plenty of small chunks of butter, which is what you are looking for!

Turn it out onto countertop and wrap for the chill. Now, you can chill for at least 2 hours, or just make it the day before like I did.

Rolling out your dough

Once the dough has chilled, place in on the counter top about 5 minutes before you roll it out, this will soften it just a little bit for rolling. You will want to lightly flour your countertop for rolling. I used a 9 inch pan and rolled my dough to about 12 inches. You want to have wiggle room.

Now, carefully press it into your tart pan.

You can cut off the excess, but I find it just as easy to press down on the edges, this cuts it off in such a simple way.

Baking your shell

This tart shell is blind baked, meaning it is baked with no filling in it. You do this to reduce shrinkage of your dough in the pan. This is especially important with an all butter crust. I prefer to do this with either pie weights or beans. Beans are what I have, so that is what I used. Line the crust with either parchment or aluminum foil like I did. Just know with the aluminum foil you have to fanagle it a bit to get it out. Bake for about 10 minutes, remove the foil and bake another 5-10. Remove and allow to cool slightly.

Making ganache filling

Now, time to start on the filling. It is ganache. Not familiar with this? It is a simple mix with chocolate and heavy cream. Not exactly low cal, but really yummy and totally simple to make. I used a dark chocolate, it was about 76%.

Now, pour that yummy ganache into the bake crust. Y’all, yum. Chocolate and chocolate, that is what I am talking about!!

You can smooth the top if you like, but since I knew I was covering it in strawberries, I didn’t worry about it. Isn’t it pretty though?? Chill this for at least 2 hours. You will want this to set as it is easier to cut and serve if it is. If you can’t wait, I can understand that as well!

Simple syrup glaze

Now, the next step is totally unnecessary and optional. I made a simple syrup to brush over my strawberries. Again, not necessary, but really pretty on aesthetics. A simple syrup is 2 parts sugar to one part water. I used 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 cup water. Bring to a boil over medium heat and allow to cook another 2-3 minutes.

Prepping your strawberries

Now, prep your strawberries however you want to for the topping. I quartered mine, but cut how you want.

Assembling the dark chocolate strawberry topped tart

Pile the berries on top of the tart. You can add as many as you want. I like quite a few, so I piled them on. I used almost 4 cups of quartered strawberries on mine.

Brush the simple syrup on the berries if you are using.

You can see with the berries on top, the simple syrup gives them such a pretty shine.

In case there wasn’t enough chocolate in the tart already, I also melted more chocolate (adding a little coconut oil for smoothness), and drizzled it on top.

I should be embarrassed to admit we finished this tart within 2 sittings- 2 hours apart, but I’m not :). This dark chocolate strawberry topped tart is just that good!

Here’s a little side view of what the tart looks like. Yes, so much chocolate!

Even looking at the tart I am salivating again. I think I am addicted. You could share in my addiction, just try this Dark Chocolate Strawberry topped Tart. I promise you will be hooked too!

Other pie inspiration

Are you looking for other pie ideas? I have a few, they are after all, one of my favorite types of dessert!