Eggless Ferrero Rocher Tarts

          Last two months, I was not able to take part in the Eggless Baking challenges, I missed those wonderful bakes, but I am going to try them later. This month no matter what,I was determined to do it, and we had a superb challenge for this month, Eggless Ferrero Tarts ( known as such, since the Ferrero Rocher chocolates was the inspiration for these tarts ), it was suggested by Priya Srinivasan of Enveetu Kitchen, you can check out the original recipe at Trissalicious. It involves a couple of steps, baking the tarts, making the tart fillings and finally assembling the tart. Though it may sound and look like a lot of work, it was not a difficult task, I totally enjoyed doing it and of course eating it too, my family simply loved it..

Need To Have
For the Tart Base

• All Purpose Flour/ Maida - 1/2 cup
• Cocoa Powder - 2 tablespoons
• Caster Sugar - 2 tablespoons
• Butter - 4 tablespoons
• Curd/ Yogurt - 2 tablespoons
• Baking Powder - 1/4 teaspoon
• Salt - a very small pinch

For the Walnut Praline

• Roasted And Chopped Walnuts - 1/2 cup
• Sugar - 1/4 cup
• Water - 2 tablespoons

For the Hazelnut Mousse

• Milk - 3/4 cup
• Vanilla Custard Powder - 2 tablespoons
• Nutella - 2 tablespoons
• Fresh Cream - 1/4 cup
• Confectioner's Sugar - 1 tablespoon
• China Grass/ Agar agar - 4" long and 2" wide piece
• Water - 3 tablespoons

For the Chocolate Hazelnut Thing

• Milk Chocolate - 8 square pieces
• Nutella - 11/2 tablespoon
• Dark Chocolate Chips - 2 tablespoons
• Walnut Praline - 4 teaspoons
• Oil - 1/2 teaspoon

Method
Tart Base

          Take the butter, cocoa powder and sugar and mix it well, I did it by hand. Then add the flour and baking powder and mix it again.

          Finally add the curd and bring it together into a smooth dough, refrigerate it for an hour.

          After and hour, take it out and roll it out into discs that are 2 mm thick, I used tart pans that measures 4.5 x .75, so I divided the dough into 3 parts and rolled out the discs ( the discs have to be a little bigger than the tart pan ). Place the discs in the tart pans and refrigerate them for an hour. Remove, prick it lightly with a fork and blind bake it for 10mins at 180C. Blind baking is nothing but, placing a piece of parchment paper on top of the dough in the tart pan with some beans like chickpeas to hold the paper and baking it. After 10 minutes, remove the parchment paper and beans and bake the tarts for another 10 to 15 minutes till done. Cool it and top it with the fillings.

Walnut Praline

          Take the sugar and water in a pan and bring it to a boil. When it starts turning a slight amber/ honey color add the walnut pieces.

          Mix and remove immediately and spread it on a plate lined with a parchment paper. Let it cool completely, then pound it lightly with a pestle and keep.

Hazlenut Mousse

          Mix the custard powder with 1/4 cup milk, heat the remaining 1/2 cup milk. Remove the milk from the stove and mix in the custard mixture. Then put it back on the stove and mix briskly for another 2 to 3 minutes till it thickens like a porridge, remove and cool it.

          Take the fresh cream and confectioners sugar and whisk it well till you get stiff whipping cream.

          Take the china grass and water and heat till the china grass completely dissolves in the water.

          Now add the nutella to the custard and mix it well, I used the electric beater.

          Then add it to the whipped cream and mix it well. Finally add the china grass and mix it properly and refrigerate it for at least an hour.

Chocolate Hazelnut Thing

          Take all the ingredients in a bowl and microwave it till the chocolate melts, mix and keep.

To assemble the Tarts
          Remove the tarts from the tart tins, pipe a layer of the Hazelnut Mousse, top it with the Chocolate Hazelnut Thing, sprinkle some walnut praline and serve.

Note
The original recipe used hazelnut praline, I have used walnuts instead.
Baking time varies, depending on the size of the tarts and the oven.
I have used 2 tablespoons of curd to make the dough, add more or less as required to mix the dough.
While making the praline, watch out carefully for the amber color and do the next steps swiftly, and be careful while handling the hot mixture.