2019 Recipes

Steamed Chocolate Cake (Patti)

Stove top Chocolate Cake (adapted from Milk Street Café recipe)

Mix together dry ingredients:

· 142 g (1 c) flour (I use almond flour)

· 29 g (1/3 c) cocoa (I use a mix of Penzey's high fat cocoa and La Boite A Epices Apollonia)

· ½ tsp salt

· 1 tsp baking soda

· 198 g, (1 c) brown sugar

· 1 tsp espresso powder (I use Starbucks instant coffee)

Mix together wet ingredients:

· 2 large eggs, whipped about 30 seconds with a whisk

· 6 T melted butter (use other two in the stick to grease the pan)

· 1 ½ tsp vanilla

· 1 cup yogurt

Dust cocoa into buttered 9” springform pan.

Combine wet and dry ingredients and pour into springform pan.

Put upside down pie tin or steamer basket in bottom of large cast iron dutch oven and fill up to 2/3 height of this pan with water.

Start heating up water. When it simmers, add spring form pan with cake filling and put on lid.

Steam for 23 minutes, then remove from heat and remove lid and let cool.

Remove spring form pan and serve.

(Nice to serve with sauce of Nutella + cream+ vanilla and/or ice cream)

Brown Butter Sea Salt Shortbread (Barry)

Ingredients:

• 85 g butter
• 40 g dark brown sugar
• 100 g KA AP flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 TSP grainy sea salt

1) Brown the butter; it will smell "nutty" and the milk-solids will turn brown and even a bit darker. If it smells burned, toss that and start again.

2) Whilst the butter is browning, measure out the brown sugar, vanilla into a mixing bowl. Combine the flour and baking soda and sift into the same mixing bowl. Smoosh together thoroughly -- no need to beat.

3) Add the butter and allow the mixture to cool.

4) Oven to 300 convection, 325 straight bake.

5) Add sea salt to cooled mixture and mix in. [The point is to keep large chunks of salt rather than just dissolving salt into the batter. But you might not like that. You can also reserve some of the salt for sprinkling on top and pressing in.]

I like these small, so I use a #100 scoop and get a dozen cookies from these amounts. It's shortbread, so won't spread much.

I pressed a "Momotombo Cacao Seed covered with Organic Chocolate" on the top of each to make it eligible for the Chocolate Party.

You could probably come up with other flavors; they are also tasty just as shortbread.

Mocha Bavarian Cream (Derek)

(adapted from The Great Dessert Book)

Ingredients

• 6 egg yolks
• ½ cup caster sugar (baker’s sugar)
• 2 cups milk
• 2 envelopes unflavored gelatin
• 1 tablespoon instant espresso or instant coffee powder
• 3 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate
• 2 cups heavy cream (chilled)
• 2 tablespoons caster sugar

Procedure

Melt the chocolate and allow it to cool while you make the custard

Separate the eggs and put the yolks into a quart bowl

Carefully whisk in (balloon whisk, not electric mixer) the ½ cup of sugar, then whisk harder to cream the yolks and sugar into a creamy but not frothy mixture

Heat the milk to near boiling, and add little by little to the egg and sugar mixture, stirring continuously

Heat the resulting custard over gentle heat with constant stirring – DO NOT allow it to boil, unless you like sweet scrambled eggs – until it has thickened enough to coat the back of a spoon (or make a rose-like pattern on the spoon when blown gently on)

Bloom the gelatin in a couple of tablespoons of cold water

When the custard is thick enough, add the gelatin and stir to dissolve, and add the espresso powder and stir to dissolve

Strain the custard through a fine sieve, and cool in a large bowl over ice

Stir in the melted chocolate when both are cool

When the mocha custard is cool to cold – don’t let it set up too firm,

Whip the cream and 2 tablespoons of sugar until firm

Stir (balloon whisk) the whipped cream into the custard

You’re done: pour into individual containers if desired and grate a little chocolate over the top for decoration

Double Chocolate Cakes with Almond Flour (Anita)

• 15 ounces Nestle's chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup heavy cream or whole milk
• 6 TBS unsalted butter
• 5 large eggs, separated
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 3/4 cup almond flour

1. Melt 3 ounces chocolate chips + cream or milk. Place in a covered container in your freezer -- must be completely frozen.
2. Melt butter and remaining chocolate chips. cool to warm
3. Using an electric mixer combine egg yolks, 1/4 cup sugar and vanilla. Once mixed add flour just enough to be mixed in (don't over beat). Add melted chocolates until just mixed (don't over beat)
4. In a clean mixer beat egg whites until foamy and peaks are just starting to form (start slow, move to medium). Add remaining 1/4 cup sugar
5. Fold egg whites into chocolate mixture 1/3 at a time
6. Fill cup cake liners 1/3 full of batter. Using a spoon create a ball of frozen ganache place in each cup cake, cover the ganache with 1/3 amount of batter (batter will rise, don't fill past top.
7. Freeze until solid -- either an hour or up to a month
8. Place frozen cakes in a 350 oven for 20-25 minutes -- don't over-bake -- take out of oven when the smell of chocolate fills the room.

Carbon Chocolate Cake (Mike)

I wanted to try black cocoa, which is ultra-Dutch Process cocoa powder. Some recipes suggest mixing black cocoa with other Dutch Process cocoa, but I thought this group might appreciate tasting it full strength. Similarly, I used a simple glaze recipe. I used King Arthur Flour Black Cocoa (Sur La Table had it). I tried it with and without coffee, and liked it better without it. I used a 10-cup Bundt pan to make a C shape for carbon. The original recipe used two 9-inch round pans and had a more elaborate and fluffy frosting to make a layer cake. I dusted the pan with cocoa instead of flour to ensure a dark finish. The recipe said to bake 35-45 minutes. I checked it starting at 40 and it ended up a little over 45 minutes.

Ingredients for the cake

• 1/2 cup vegetable oil, plus more for the pans
• 2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for the pans
• 1 cup unsweetened black cocoa powder (King Arthur Flour Black Cocoa)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped (ScharffenBerger)
• 1 tablespoon instant coffee granules (I omitted this)
• 1 1/2 cups boiling water
• 3/4 cup sour cream
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 3 large eggs
• 2 cups sugar
• Ingredients for the glaze
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted
• 1/4 cup unsweetened black cocoa powder (King Arthur Flour Black Cocoa)
• 3 tablespoons heavy (whipping) cream

Method

Preheat the oven to 350°. Brush the inside of the Bundt pan with vegetable oil and dust with cocoa, tapping out the excess. Whisk the flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking soda and baking powder in a medium bowl.

In a separate small bowl, combine the chopped chocolate and instant coffee; pour in the boiling water and let stand 5 minutes, then whisk until smooth.

Combine the sour cream, vegetable oil and vanilla in a liquid measuring cup (it will look curdled).

Beat the eggs and sugar in a large bowl with a mixer on medium speed until combined. Increase the speed to medium high and beat until light and fluffy, 4 to 5 minutes.

Reduce the mixer speed to low and slowly add the coffee-chocolate mixture; beat until combined. Beat in the flour mixture in three batches, alternating with the sour cream mixture in two batches, until just incorporated. (Keep the mixer on low as you add the ingredients, then increase the speed to medium briefly between additions to beat out the lumps.) The batter should look like hot fudge. Pour the batter into the Bundt pan.

Bake 35-45 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean, Let it cool 15 minutes in the pan, then invert it onto a cake rack. Let it cool completely.

For the glaze

Sift the powdered sugar and black cocoa into a sauce pan. Stir in the cream over a low heat and continue stirring until smooth. Remove from the heat. It will thicken as it cools, so when it is thick enough to stay on the top and sides of the cake, spoon it over it.

Chocolate Cornbread Compound (Susan & Mike)

In first bowl, add:

• 2/3 C baker’s sugar (superfine sugar)
• 2/3 C flour, sifted
• 2/3 C cornmeal, fine or coarse
• 1T baking powder
• 2/3 C unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1t salt
• 6 oz chocolate chips (optional)

Mix all dry ingredients together

In second bowl, add

• 2 eggs
• 1 C milk
• 1/3 C olive oil

Whisk wet ingredients together

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients. Stir to form smooth mixture.

Pour into greased loaf pan.

Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes

Cool about 20 minutes.

Cut around edges and overturn loaf pan to release.