Peppermint Chocolate Ganache Tart

Holiday baking is my favorite time of the year! These Peppermint Chocolate Ganache Tarts are so festive and easy to make, using the one of my favorite chocolate brands, Taza Chocolate

I’m so excited about Taza’s amazing baking collection! My husband thought it was coffee when he saw the huge bag at first, but he was equally excited to see dark chocolate. We have the 70% because for us, the darker, the better.

When making ganache, it’s important to have well chopped chocolate, so the chocolate melts without burning. These precut baking chocolates save me so much work. We’ve been so crazy busy with weddings and traveling as well as hosting visitors at our apartments and entertaining the last month (on top of 28 hour hospital calls), I’ll take any time saver.

These tarts use an easy chocolate graham crust with even easier ganache inside. Ganache is a a filling of chocolate and cream, used in everything from cakes to tarts to truffles.

To make it festive, I topped it with peppermints (kindly given to us by our care coordinator from inpatient medicine – residents love people who keep chocolate and candy on their desks). The peppermints melted a little because I was too impatient and added them before the chocolate cooled down. Recipe adapted from Epicurious.

Peppermint Chocolate Ganache Tart

Ingredients
CRUST
1 cup (about 10) chocolate graham crackers finely ground
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1/4 cup sugar

GANACHE
scant 1 cup heavy cream
10 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped (Taza chocolate baking collection)
1 large egg
peppermints, crushed for garnish

Directions
CRUST
Preheat oven to 350F

Combine crackers, butter, and sugar and press evenly onto tart pan. Bake until firm, about 10 minutes and let cool.

GANACHE
Make a double boiler by boiling water in a pot with a heat-safe bowl on top. Add heavy cream and heat up. Add chopped chocolate to the hot cream and gently stir until smooth. Whisk an egg in another bowl, then stir quickly into melted chocolate (careful not to scramble the egg).

Pour ganache filling into cooled crust. Cool for about 20 min and when ganache is starting to harden, then top with crushed peppermints. Serve cool.