Hand selected by The Alchemist
Hand selected by The Alchemist
Playing with chocolate is always the best way to learn.
Arguably the best milk chocolate ever!
As a review for people, this isn't a new chocolate. I talk about it in Ask the Alchemist 219.
I have a love affair with deeply authentic Mexican mole.
A wonderful recipe for Double Cocoa Sourdough.
An easy recipe for cocoa bean cream.
Two of life's great gifts in one mouthful.
Now then, I know from experience a lot of you are going to just shy of flip out over the last ingredient. Stop it. It is an ingredient. It’s not poison. It is Ethyl Alcohol. i.e. alcohol. What’s in the rum and red wine and what we need at 14-15%. It’s no different. AT ALL. Moving on.
So, for those of you not ready to jump into full Artisan Chocolate, might I suggest just making up your own varietal baker's chocolate and using it where ever you would use that stale bitter stuff from the store.
A delicious torte to see you through.
I have verified that it is a breeze to make chocolate syrup for use in whatever you might use chocolate syrup for. Personally I am stirring a spoonful into my morning coffee for an instant REAL mocha.
Technically, white chocolate is not chocolate at all as it has not cocoa solids in it, but a lot of people have been asking for a recipe, so here it is.
This is a pretty traditional tasting chocolate, expect it contains goat's milk powder.
This reminds me of any number of varietal less dark "dark chocolates" out there that are typical of Trinatario cocoa beans. Nice, fruity and good.
It really does not get any simpler than this. But, OH what a flavor. It reminds me of any number of varietal "dark chocolates" out there. This formulation will make about 2 pounds of chocolate.
A little nib goes a long way in this classic recipe.
This reminds me of any number of varietal "dark chocolates" out there that are typical of Criollo cocoa bean. Nice, fruity and good. This formulation will make about 3 pounds of chocolate.
This is a time tested recipe for Chocolate Truffles which will show you they're much easier to make than you might think.
This is a really nice milk chocolate, but probably nothing like you have ever had. It has a higher than traditional cocoa content. I find I really like it this way as you are not trying to hide any cocoa defect flavors behind the milk and sugar. A few milk chocolates out there have Criollo, but not many. This formulation will make about 5.5 pounds of "45 % cocoa" chocolate.
If the thought of making chocolate right off the bat is a bit daunting, I would suggest you get you feet wet with just baking with some fresh cocoa. Actually, any recipe you find that calls for unsweetened baker's chocolate, you can just use your own cocoa liqueur. That is all it is after all. Pick your bean of choice (a rich Caranero or maybe a fruity Ocumare), roast it, shell it (for this amount, doing it by hand is not that bad) and grind it in your champion for a smooth liqueur or just a whirly blade grinder for more texture (really nice in the brownies).
All of the recipes in this first section are from Alice Medrich: Bittersweet; Recipes and Tales from a Life in Chocolate. All of the recipes in this section call for cocoa nibs. A nice light introduction to cooking with fresh cocoa beans. Just roast up your cocoa beans of choice and then remove the husk by hand or with our cocoa mill.
If you get the chance to get this book, please do. It is amazing. Also, a thank you to Martha Simmons who got me the original recipes.
I have personally experimented with the following and really love results. These are recipes either that I have worked out or have collected from an unknown source over the years. In general, they call for you to roast your own beans and then make your own cocoa liqueur. Sort of the intermediate step to full chocolate making.
Chocolate Praline Spread
Flourless Chocolate Cake
If you find a recipe that calls for bittersweet chocolate, just read this as 70% cocoa, 30% sugar. So if you find a chocolate cake recipe that calls for 8 oz of bittersweet chocolate, I just put in 5.6 oz (actually I round up to 6 oz, I figure you can't have too much chocolate really) of cocoa liqueur, and 2.4 oz of sugar. Once all the rest of the ingredients are added, the sugar will dissolve and no one will be the wiser (except, of course, this may well be richer - life is so tough)
If you come up with a recipe either for a dessert or a nice chocolate, let me know and I will see about putting it up here.