Velvety White Chocolate Tart With Lemon Pastry

This thick and velvety white chocolate tart encased in sweet lemon pastry drizzled with a raspberry coulis that hits all the flavour jackpots. I made so much pastry whilst training at Ashburton Chef's Academy recently and couldn't wait to make some variations and create something decadent and delicious. This sweet lemon pastry has a zesty and fresh flavour along with a perfect amount of crunch, and perfectly complements the rich whipped white chocolate ganache filling. Tangy raspberry coulis completes the picture, balancing all the flavours and preventing it from being too sickly sweet (as white chocolate can often be).

This is a no bake white chocolate tart, the lemon pastry is cooked to perfection and then we simply prepare the whipped white chocolate ganache, pour it into the sweet pastry case and leave it to set. It's an ideal dessert for dinner parties or special occasions as you can make it in advance and whip it out ready to serve.

Sweet pastry is harder to master than a savoury shortcrust, in my opinion. The sugar makes it more volatile and you'll need to keep it cool whilst working it. When I was doing my chef training, we always made our sweet pastry first thing in the morning before the kitchen got too hot, which helps a lot. Whatever you do, don't make the lemon pastry when you have the oven on and a stove top full of steaming pots and pans! You can make a sweet pastry case ahead of time and freeze it easily, which makes things easier to manage.

Now we come to the filling. I wanted to create a smooth, decadent white chocolate tart where the filling was almost like a smooth chocolate truffle, and didn't require gelatine or baking. A ganache is chocolate and cream melted together, and the sign of a good ganache is the consistency and a shiny, glossy surface. But white chocolate is much harder to make ganache with as it has no cocoa nib content, only cocoa butter and this makes it behave differently to dark and milk chocolate. You need a lot less cream or it goes far too runny and won't set, but therefore there is a risk of it setting too hard! This is why we make a whipped white chocolate ganache it to add air and fluff it up. The quality of white chocolate you use will make a difference, as will the cream as their respective water and cocoa butter content till vary. For best results, use the highest quality cream and white chocolate you can buy.

Keep reading for all my tips on how to make a perfect sweet lemon pastry and a delicious whipped white chocolate ganache to make a delicious and decadent white chocolate tart.

Jump to:

• Ingredients
• Instructions
• How to make a white chocolate ganache
• How to make raspberry coulis
• Plating suggestions
• Wine pairing
• Variations
• Equipment
• Storage
• Top tip
• White Chocolate Tart With Lemon Pastry

Ingredients

• Unsalted butter
• Icing sugar / confectioners sugar
• Egg yolk
• Water
• Lemon
• White chocolate
• Double Cream / heavy whipping cream
• Raspberries

See the recipe card for quantities.

Instructions

First, make your sweet lemon pastry case.

Soften the butter slightly so it's easier to work with, but not too much. I recommend just getting it out of the fridge 30 minutes earlier and cutting into small pieces.

Sieve the sugar into a bowl and add the butter. Cream them together with a stiff spatula by stirring and pressing down until they are all combined and it forms a thick, pale consistency. You can use an electric whisk, but go easy as we don't want to overwork it.

Now sieve in the flour and stir/cut it into the butter and sugar mixture, until it resembles ground almonds with no big lumps of butter. Stir through the lemon zest.

Mix the egg yolks and water together and add half of it to the flour mixture. From then on, add it one tablespoon at a time because depending on a variety of factors including the size of the egg yolk and the water content in your butter, you may end up making it too wet if you add all of it in one go. We want a soft, bordering just slightly on sticky dough. Remember you can always add more liquid, but you can't take it away. Use your fingers to swirl the egg into the flour mixture, and as it starts to come together assess how it feels. Don't bring it together too soon, as it is makes it much harder to add more liquid if needed. If you find you need even more liquid then simple add teaspoons of water until it's right.

Once you have reached the right consistency, turn the lemon pastry out onto a piece of cling film/food wrap, flatten it out into a disc about one or two inches thick, wrap it up and place it in the fridge for one hour. The reason we make it into a disc is because it makes it easier to roll out once it's chilled down and rested.

Once it has rested, take it out of the fridge and turn out onto a surface dusted with a little more flour. Roll it out into a circle, taking care to turn it over and move it around a few times so it does not stick to the work surface. Use more dusting flour as needed.

Once it is the right size for your pastry tin and around three or four millimetres thick, gently fold it up and transfer onto the tin base before unfolding and carefully shaping into the edges (see video).

Rest the lemon pastry in the fridge for another 30 minutes, and preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F.

Use a piece of baking paper to line the inside of the pastry and then fill it with baking beads (or uncooked rice if you don't have any) to prevent it rising up whilst cooking.

Bake in the oven for 15 minutes, before removing the baking beads and continuing to bake for a further 5-10 minutes until golden brown and cooked through. Transfer to a cooling rack and leave to cool down whilst you make your whipped white chocolate ganache filling.

How to make a white chocolate ganache

Measure out your cream and pour into a saucepan. Heat until it reaches steaming point (just before boiling).

Break/chop the white chocolate into small pieces in a bowl and pour the hot cream over the top. Allow them to get to know one another for a minute before stirring and helping the chocolate melt into the cream. You can add some more butter at this stage if you like, to make it even richer and more like a white chocolate truffle filling.

Leave the ganache to cool and thicken in the fridge for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to keep it stable and combined.

Now whisk it to fluff it up and thicken further, before pouring the whipped white chocolate ganache into the lemon pastry case and leaving in the fridge for a few hours or overnight until set.

How to make raspberry coulis

Make your raspberry coulis by blending the fruit together and then adjusting the sweetness with lemon juice and sugar. I prefer mine quite tart and tangy, but you can play with it to suit you.

Serve the white chocolate tart with raspberry coulis drizzled over the top and enjoy!

Hint: Don't trim off the excess lemon pastry until the sweet pastry case is baked. This saves you from an uneven crust in case parts of it are thinner than others and they shrink.

Plating suggestions

Leave this white chocolate tart whole and decorate with the raspberry coulis - it makes an excellent centrepiece for dessert. Coloured plates work better than plain white as the colours will stand out beautifully. Garnish with some fresh raspberries as well to add some texture.

Wine pairing

Chocolate is a tricky thing to pair with wine, but an Australian shiraz can work well as it is often described as both having chocolatey and raspberry flavours. Otherwise, I'd serve a raspberry liquor or even a Limoncello to highlight the citrus.

Variations

Here are a few ways you can change up this recipe to suit you...

• More lemon - if you want to add even more lemon flavour then you can infuse the cream with grated lemon rind before straining it out and mixing it with the chocolate as per the instructions.
• Other citrus - try using lime or orange instead!
• Chocolate crust - Substituting a tablespoon of good quality cocoa powder for a tablespoon of the flour will give you a dark chocolaty pastry

Like white chocolate? Try this showstopper of a triple decker white chocolate and pistachio cake I baked for my birthday last year.

Equipment

You will need...

• Mixing bowls
• Sieve
• Spatula
• Spoons
• Saucepan
• 10 inch loose base tart tin
• Blender
• Electric whisk

Storage

Store any leftovers in the fridge, and use within 3 days.

The sweet lemon pastry crust will freeze well after baking, use within a month or so.

Top tip

Use a vegetable peeler at an angle to shave off the excess lemon pastry from the top of the pastry case. Brush away any crumbs from inside the case with a pastry brush.

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