Chocolate Strawberry Tart
This Chocolate Strawberry Tart features a dark chocolate cookie crust filled with chocolate pastry cream and it’s topped with fresh strawberries. If you love chocolate covered strawberries (and who doesn’t) you’ll love this dessert.
When strawberries are in season you’ve got to eat as many as you can, in as many ways as you can. After eating them out of hand by the quart, it’s time to get baking.
Obviously, chocolate and strawberries are a marriage made in heaven. So here’s yet another way to celebrate one of the greatest flavor combinations.
Except for slicing the fresh berries, the components of this tart can be prepared ahead of time. It’s a great make-ahead dessert.
How to make a Chocolate Strawberry Tart:
- Pour the warm chocolate pastry cream into the pre-baked chocolate tart crust.
- Spread the pastry cream until it’s smooth.
- Cover the pastry cream with wax paper so a skin doesn’t form on the surface. Chill.
- Slice the berries to 1/4″ thick.
- Arrange the sliced berries over the chocolate pastry cream.
- The slices will form a pretty floral pattern.
- Warm the strawberry jelly.
- Brush the jelly over the strawberry tart. Chill until set.
Tips for making the best Chocolate Strawberry Tart:
- Because you can’t use visual cues to know if the tart crust is baked (can’t see the browning) press the center of the tart to make sure it doesn’t feel doughy.
- Spread the chocolate pastry cream into the shell while the custard is still warm. Cover the pastry cream with wax paper, buttered parchment or plastic. This will prevent a skin from forming on the surface as the custard chills.
- If your strawberries are not all the same size (they almost never are) start with the largest strawberries around the outside edges of the tart and use gradually smaller berries towards the center.
- If your strawberry jam has chunks of fruit, strain it after you warm it up. The glaze is prettier without the random bits of fruit marring the surface.
- When strawberries are out of season you can top the tart with raspberries, mandarin oranges or the fruit(s) of your choice.
How to work ahead to make this recipe:
- The chocolate tart dough can be made several days ahead and and stored in the refrigerator. The dough can be frozen for up to a month.
- Once the dough is rolled and in the pan you can bake it and keep it at room temperature for a day.
- The pastry cream can be made a day ahead and placed in the prepared tart shell. Cover the tart and keep refrigerated for a day before adding the strawberries.
- It’s best to slice the strawberries just as you put them onto the tart. If you slice them ahead they’ll loose too much moisture as they sit.
- The finished tart is best the day it’s made but will keep in the refrigerator for 2-3 days. After the first day the crust may soften from the strawberry juice.
Here are 10 strawberry recipes for you to try:
- Classic Strawberry Shortcakes
- Chocolate Strawberry Mousse Cake
- Strawberry Tall Cake
- Strawberry Mousse
- Fresh Strawberry Pie
- Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream
- Roasted Strawberry Hand Pies
- Tempura Strawberries
- Strawberries & Cream Bundt Cake
- Strawberry & Rose Wine Macarons
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Chocolate Strawberry Tart Recipe
A dark chocolate tart crust filled with chocolate pastry cream and topped with fresh strawberries.
slices
Ingredients
- 1 recipe Chocolate Tart Dough
- 1 recipe Chocolate Pastry Cream
- 24 oz Strawberres (hulled)
- 6 oz Strawberry jelly (1/2 cup)
Instructions
- Roll the chocolate short dough to fit into a 12" tart pan with a removable bottom. Prick the bottom of the pan with a fork several times and refrigerate. While the tart dough is chilling, preheat the oven to 350 °F.1 recipe Chocolate Tart Dough
- Bake the tart shell until it's set all the way to the center, about 15 minutes. Because of the dark color it's hard to see if it's browning. You need to press the center of the crust to make sure it's set. Cool the tart crust completely.
- Make the chocolate pastry cream according to the recipe. While it's still warm pour it into the prepared tart shell. Cover with buttered parchment or wax paper and refrigerate until the pastry cream is well-chilled and set.1 recipe Chocolate Pastry Cream
- Slice the strawberries to 1/4" thick. You can set aside the rounded end pieces for another use. Starting from the outside edge of the tart, overlap the strawberry slices with the points facing out. Continue making concentric circles working towards the center of the tart. The strawberries will form a pretty flower pattern.24 oz Strawberres
- Warm the strawberry jelly in a microwave proof container until it's pourable. If needed, strain the jelly to remove any chunks of fruit. Brush the warm jelly over the strawberries, allowing excess to drip between the berries. The jelly will help hold the berries in place.6 oz Strawberry jelly
- Chill until serving.
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Hi Eileen! I love your recipes–thank you for all of the work you put into this site. I would consider myself a fairly experienced cook, but I had some trouble with the pastry cream. I followed the directions exactly and measured all ingredients carefully, but I ended up with a gloppy mess that was too thick to sieve. I questioned adding 2 tablespoons of cornstarch to such a small amount of liquid, but decided to follow your directions. Is there any chance that that is a typo and is meant to be 2 teaspoons instead? I’m scratching my head over this.
Hmmm, the chocolate pastry cream is based on my regular pastry cream recipe, just with chopped chocolate added. I’ve been using this recipe for years. You want enough starch so as the pastry cream cools it is thick enough to pipe and hold it’s shape. The cream is thick after it’s cooked but as long as you strain it right away while it’s still hot you should be able to pour it through the sieve. How long did you cook it after adding the starch and eggs? You just need to see a couple of bubbles and then immediately take it off the heat.
@Eileen Gray, Thank you for your answer! I slowly poured the scalded milk into the egg/cornstarch mixture and everything looked fine. I remember now though that once I poured everything back into the pan, I had my burner on low heat, but it never bubbled, but it got really thick really quickly. So I removed it from the burner, but it was already too thick to sieve. I probably left it too long on the burner, I’m guessing. I’ll try it again to see what happens.
Finally had a moment to try this recipe. It all went together well and everyone loved it. Instead of one big tart, I made 6 4-5″ tarts using a mini-version of the pan you used.
Could you give an approximate time to bake the crust
Thanks
Oh, sorry. About 15 minutes.