Chocolate and Strawberry Tart

I am having some galfriends over for dinner, like I always do, during the weekend. It is a good time to catch up and find out what everyone has been doing and listen to scandalous stories of their co-workers. Ahhhhh... the joys of gossip!

I usually try to balance out a whole meal. There are 2 basic rules to follow: never overpower each dish and never overfeed your guests. You always want them coming back for more... So, pick one dish that will be the talk of the morning after. In this case, it was dessert...

With most women, there is always one weakness - the sight of "chocolate meets strawberries". I never know why, but the look of fresh, bright red, sweet-smelling strawberries placed seductively over chocolate makes my knees wobble.

So if you are anything like me, you will love the recipe below.

Chocolate and Strawberry Tart - serves 6

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry

25g plain flour

125g butter, chilled and cut into small cubes

80g icing sugar

3 egg yolks

1 tablespoon iced water

Filling

225g good quality chocolate

375ml single cream

3 egg yolks

500g fresh strawberries, hulled

icing sugar for dusting

Preparation time: 20 mins
Cooking time: Half the morning
Level of difficulty: Easy peasy

We start with making the pastry-

Place flour, butter and sugar in the bowl of a food processor and process in pulses until mixture looks like breadcrumbs.

Slowly add in the egg yolks and water in between processing the mixture. Once the dough is formed, take it out and place it on a lightly floured surface. Shape the dough into a ball, wrap it in cling film and refrigerate for an hour.

Preheat the oven to 180'C.

Take the dough out from the refrigerator and roll it out between 2 sheet of non-stick paper to about 3mm thickness.

Line a lightly greased tart tin (22cm-loose bottom) with pastry.

Trim edges and fork the pastry to prevent blisters. Refrigerate for 30mins.

Take pastry out and place a non-stick backing paper on top and fill with rice(uncooked) or baking weights. Pop into the oven for 10mins.

Remove the paper and rice/baking weights

Set aside to cool.

Reduce the oven to 140'C.

Place the chocolate and cream in a saucepan and stir until melted and smooth.

Remove from heat and whisk in the egg yolks.

Spoon mixture onto the pastry case and bake for 35mins or until the filling is set.

Remove from oven and cool the mixture in tin.

Top with strawberries and dust with icing sugar.