Chocolate pots, not for the weak

This is the last recipe I am sharing from our lunch party. It is also the yummiest!! Let's just say that for a good 10 min there was almost total silence as we all indulged on this dessert. Think I ate mine rather quickly as each spoonful was just too heavenly - yep, taking pictures was the last thing on my mind then!! - it ended all too soon as I scrapped every last bit from the the bottom of the cup and almost eating the spoon itself, darn and to think I ALMOST had 2 leftover servings!! ha ha ha....oh well, can make more again.

Make them in small portions otherwise they might feel rather sinful.

Think when my mum got these face espresso cups I was frowning inside *of course I didn't say anything other than - 'cute', wanna die or what!!* But am eating my words thoughts now since they were the prefect 'ramekins' for my chocolate pot. And to think I nearly bought some ugly espresso cups - it was white with an ugly flower on it, thankfully they didn't have sufficient cups and ended up not getting any. More grateful is that I didn't waste money getting something I didn't really like and also save cupboard space since I got to borrow those cute cups from M instead!!!



Adapted from Baking from My home to yours by Dorie Greenspan
(makes about 10 espresso cups, maybe 11 if I was more careful and didn't spill)

150g dark chocolate
1.5 cups whipping cream
1.5 cups whole milk
1 large egg
5 egg yolks
45g caster sugar (more if you have a sweeter tooth but all adults thought the sweetness was just nice. MP wished it was sweeter so the scoop of ice cream helped.)
pinch of salt

Alternative flavourings - 1 tbsp coffee or 1 tbsp baileys irish cream (optional)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 150 degrees.

2. Line roasting pan with 2 layers of paper towel and place ramekins into pan.

3. Bring 1/2 cup cream to a boil and immediately pour over chocolate and let sit 1 min before gently stirring until you get a smooth ganache. Set aside.

4. Combine remaining 1 cup cream with milk and bring to boil.

5. Whisk egg, yolks, sugar and salt until pale and slightly thickened. Whisk in small amount of hot milk to temper the eggs. Slowly whisk in remaining hot milk. Then gently stir in egg mixture into ganache. Use an ordinary hand held whisk and not machine otherwise you will end up with too much froth/foam.

6. Gently pour custard through a sieve into cups and skim foam from surface (if any).

7. Cover tightly pots with Glad wrap, poke 2 holes in opposite corners and bake them in pan filled with hot water for 35 - 40 min until centres barely jiggle. But discovered it was much easier to cover with a loose aluminium foil on the top while baking them.

8. Remove from oven and allow custards to rest for 10 min before peeling plastic wrap and removing the pots from water bath.

9. Let cool to room temperature. Keep covered with plastic wrap in refrigerator and chill overnight or up to 1 day.

As you can see from the 1st picture, I served these with a light dusting of icing sugar (optional), scoop of good quality vanilla ice cream and chocolate dipped strawberries. Highly recommend this combination as it made this rich dessert lighter, more refreshing and enjoyable (not overly gelak).

Bench notes - This dessert actually took a little more effort - always gets a little messy cooking with chocolate. Best to use hot water to wash up.