Chocolate orange is one of those classic flavours. Growing up in the 1980’s, Christmas stockings were always bulked out with a hefty chocolate orange. It was such a treat, and over the years (decades!), chocolate orange has become more and more popular and available. Indeed, on my last trip around a supermarket, I found a box of Cadbury’s Chocolate Orange Fingers, and an idea for a pretty pudding was born; this simple chocolate orange tart!

Now, I just added some orange zest to my tart, and I thought the flavour was orangey enough; but if you want the full whack of chocolate orange goodness, then bars of actual chocolate orange are now available in the shops. You can easily swap out the milk chocolate for chocolate orange chocolate if that floats your boat. I feel like I’m saying the words “chocolate” and “orange” quite a bit here.

This tart is rich and delicious, it didn’t last very long at all, which is always a good sign. If I’d have let him, my 11 year old would have probably eaten the lot in one sitting!

Easy Chocolate Orange Tart

Ingredients:
For the pastry –
4oz plain flour
2oz butter, cubed
A pinch of salt
2-3 tablespoons of cold water
-or- a packet of ready rolled shortcrust pastry

For the filling –
300g single cream
4 tablespoons of sugar
300g milk chocolate
Zest of one orange
Approx 1/3 of a box of Cadbury’s Chocolate Orange Fingers

How to make a chocolate orange tart:

Tip the flour, salt and butter in a large mixing bowl. Using your fingers, rub the butter into the flour until it looks like breadcrumbs. Use a knife and stir in just enough cold water to bind the dough together. Do this gradually as you don’t want your pastry to be too wet. Once you’ve made the dough, cover the bowl and chill it in the fridge for 15 minutes or so before rolling out.

Or if you’re using shop bought, ready rolled pastry, take it out of the fridge about half an hour before you want to use it.

Pre-heat your oven to gas mark 5 or 190°

Take your pastry and roll it out to the thickness of a pound coin. You can either roll it out on a floured surface, or between two pieces of baking parchment. I find the baking parchment method quicker and a lot less messy.

Grease a 20cm tart tin and carefully put the pastry in the tin, pressing it against the sides. Let the pastry hang over the sides of the tin, you can trim it later. Prick the base all over with a fork. Top the pastry with a sheet of baking parchment and cover with baking beans, bake in your pre-heated oven for 10 minutes.

Remove the baking beans and parchment and pop back in the oven for another 8 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool. Once cool, carefully with a sharp knife trim the pastry so it is flush with the top of the tin.

While your pastry is cooling, warm up your cream and sugar in a saucepan. Finely chop the chocolate and once the cream is simmering, turn off the heat and add the chocolate to the pan. Leave for a minute and stir until the mixture is smooth, like really thick hot chocolate. Once it’s cooled a little, add around half of the finely grated orange zest and stir through.

Carefully fill the tart case with the melted chocolate mix, level it off and make an artistic swirl or ripple on the top if you want. I decorated my tart by placing the chocolate orange fingers in regular intervals, so that when you slice the tart you’ll get a chocolate finger with each delicious wedge. I then scattered the remaining orange zest over the top of the tart. Put your chocolate tart in the fridge for a minimum of two hours, or overnight if you wish.

This chocolate orange tart is rich and delicious. I don’t think it needs anything with it, but you might want to add a drizzle of cream or a scoop of ice cream. For me, it’s just perfect served on its own.

If you enjoyed this recipe, you might like this Easter mini eggs chocolate tart.