mix, mix… stir, stir

This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie baking adventure continues with more cookies. I wasn’t sure how these cookies would stay together with chunks of bittersweet chocolate, semisweet chocolate, and white chocolate, in addition to peanuts, and only a third cup of flour, even less cocoa powder and a couple of eggs acting as a structural binder. Impossible. The ingredient list just didn’t look structurally sound. It is deliciously confounding, and maybe I shall have another to further analyze the situation.

photo by David Peterman

Not only are these cookies structurally sound, they are so delicious. They taste like the cookie version of a Dairy Queen Peanut Buster Parfait. Sandwich a couple of them around some vanilla ice cream and you might have to pay a flavor royalty fee to DQ! The recipe also called for raisins, but I omitted them out of respect for David’s aversion to raisins, and no harm was done to the end result. I used honey roasted peanuts that I raided from David’s personal snack supply, which he wasn’t too happy with initially but seems to be enjoying his peanuts in the cookies just fine.

These powerfully chocolaty cookies deserve to be made with really good chocolate. With so many varieties of chocolate involved it is important to incorporate the full spectrum of chocolate flavors or the end result might border on sickly sweet. What I mean by the full spectrum is chocolates that are distinctly different from one another based on how sweet they are. If you are interested in the differences and learning how to decipher chocolate labels, read on… but first you need to know you can find this fantastic recipe in Dorie Greenspan’s book, Baking: From My Home to Yours and I would like to thank Claudia of Fool for Food for selecting such a winner of a recipe for this week.

Deciphering Chocolate Labels
The common terms used in describing different types of chocolate are cocoa powder, unsweetened, bittersweet, semisweet, milk, and white. It seems reasonable enough that these terms alone would sort out the different types of chocolate on the market, and in some situations that’s the case, but too often there are big differences between two chocolates that are both labeled “semisweet” for example. In a few instances the labels are pretty clear; with unsweetened chocolate you know it’s going to be bitter chocolate with no added sugar, but beyond that it can be a bit of a mystery.  The way to determine the difference between one bar and the next is to decipher the formula of cocoa solids, sugar, and total fat in the chocolate.

This has become easier with the increasing variety of specialty chocolates available on the market these days. More information is available on the chocolate packaging as manufacturers work to distinguish their product from all the others on the shelf and we consumers benefit from this additional information because it gives us some data to work with that is consistent across the board rather than relying on terminology that is open to interpretation. The data I am referring to are the numbers such as 58%, 61% 70% that are very common on chocolate packages anymore. You might also see a series of three numbers like this, 60/40/38. This is the key to knowing what you are buying. One company’s bittersweet might be another company’s semisweet, but when you are dealing with the numbers, the terminology doesn’t really matter.

The three ingredients in chocolate are cocoa solids (also called cocoa mass or cocao liquer), sugar and fat. Cocoa solids are simply cocoa beans ground into a fine paste. The numbers indicate the composition of the chocolate with regard to the percent cocoa solids, percent sugar and percent fat. A bar labeled 70% indicates that 70% of the weight of the chocolate is cocoa solids and fat, therefore 30% is sugar. A 62% chocolate will have more sugar and taste less bitter. When the numbers are shown as a series of three, such as 60/40/38, the first number is the percent cocoa solids, then the percent sugar, and the third indicates the percent fat. Knowing the percent fat is important when melting chocolate to dip candies or coat molds because the greater the amount of cocoa butter the better the melted chocolate will flow.

Referring to the percentage of cocoa solids in a chocolate is a more accurate indication of the sweetness of a chocolate than relying on a term. However, it does not determine the flavor because like coffee beans or wine grapes, cocoa beans are very complex and the flavor is influenced by where the beans grow, how they are fermented, roasted and processed in to chocolate. The best way to determine what kind of chocolate you like to eat is to taste a lot of it!

Milk chocolate is milder because it has added milk and a high percentage of sugar. Because of the added milk and large amount of sugar, the ratio of cocoa solids and cocoa butter are lower. This makes milk chocolate softer so it won’t have the crisp snap that a 70% dark chocolate has.

White chocolate doesn’t actually contain any cocoa solids at all, which is why it doesn’t taste like chocolate. It is made from purified cocoa butter, milk solids, and sugar. It has as soft creamy texture rather than the crisp snappy texture of dark chocolate.

Cocoa powder is made from the left over cocoa bean once the cocoa butter has been extracted. It is really a by-product of cocoa butter. It is this left over part of the cocoa bean that has all the flavor and color, so it provides a very intense chocolate flavor when added to foods. Cocoa powder is naturally very acidic so some cocoa powders are treated with the alkaline agent, potassium carbonate, to neutralize the pH. This is referred to as “Dutched” cocoa powder because the inventor of the process was Dutch. Dutched cocoa powder has a milder flavor and a darker color.

I hope this helps you sort out your chocolate choices the next time you are standing in front of a dizzying selection of chocolates trying to decide what to buy.

Chocolate pudding is the happiest dessert there is. With the first spoonful conversation inevitably ceases as my full attention is drawn to concentrating on every rich creamy bite. I blissfully drift off to a happy place thoroughly savoring the smooth luxuriousness until the clinking of the spoon on the dish fores me to accept the fact that nothing more can be scraped from the bowl.

The happiness being whipped up in the kitchens of the Tuesdays with Dorie bakers this week is thanks to the excellent selection from Melissa of It’s Melissa’s Kitchen. You can find Dorie’s delicious Chocolate Pudding recipe in her wonderful book Baking: From My Home to Yours.

What is unique about this chocolate pudding is the process rather than the ingredients. Milk, cocoa powder, sugar, cornstarch, eggs, chocolate, butter and vanilla; no surprises here. The method of mixing with a food processor both before and after the thickening process is what is interesting. Dorie’s rational is that working in some air during the processing phase creates a lighter and highly velvety texture. I concur. This is a luxurious pudding. It has good chocolate flavor and an outstanding texture. It will make you happy on the inside!

Before diving into making this recipe I was thinking about how to serve it up and I really wanted some whipped cream as a garnish, but had none. Not wanting to make a special trip to the store I spotted some sour cream in the back of the fridge and I had an instant flashback to the Strawberries Romanoff dessert that was served in a restaurant I worked in as a teenager. I recall the Romanoff sauce was just sour cream blended with some brown sugar and it was stunningly delicious.

I figured brown sugar sweetened sour cream and chocolate pudding would get along just fine together. Add a touch of cinnamon and it would be a sure thing. A quick glance at the sour cream, whew, it’s not expired. On with the sauce-de-improvisation.

Many versions of Romanoff sauce are a combination of sour cream and whipping cream, but if you have been paying attention you know that I don’t have any whipping cream. I have seen versions that add a splash of booze, orange flavoring, and different spices. Here is my version that is deliciously successful on chocolate pudding and summer-fresh strawberries.

Romanoff Sauce
1/2 cup sour cream
2 Tablespoons brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
Vigorously whisk the ingredients together until the brown sugar dissolves. Add additional cinnamon to suit your taste. Chill to set, then serve a generous dollop on chocolate pudding or fresh strawberries.

More than any other dessert item people seem to be passionately loyal to their favorite brownie recipe. Maybe it’s because brownies are more diverse than most desserts. Do you like cakey, chewy, or fudgy? A crispy top, soft top, or frosted top? Are nuts a requirement or a crime? How about other mix-ins like dried fruit, chocolate bits, or spices? 

Maybe that is why Dorie Greenspan offers us twelve different chocolate brownie recipes and two blondie options in her book Baking: From My Home to Yours. This week Di, at Di’s Kitchen Notebook, had all of us in the Tuesdays with Dorie baking club whip up the French Chocolate Brownies. Interestingly Dorie developed this recipe with the intention of it being a French chocolate fondant cake, but when she served it to dinner guests and they excitedly exclaimed “brownies!” She wisely rolled with it and the recipe is now known as French Chocolate Brownies.

The unique characteristics of this recipe are rum-soaked raisins, cinnamon, and 3 eggs. More eggs than typical brownies, but this was originally intended to be a cake. Anyone who likes their brownies on the cakey side will like these, but don’t think these are dry fluffy cake-like brownies. No sir, they are still very moist and dense with the requisite crackly top. You may bristle at the rum-soaked raisins, but I tell you they are delightful little taste treasures that surprise the palate with each bite. The raisins dress these brownies up; like fancy French brownies!

I am no different than any of you and I have my favorite brownie recipe that this will not replace. A key criterion for brownies in my book is to only dirty one bowl during the process of making them. I have also come to realize that cocoa powder is what delivers that true brownie flavor I seek. The Chocolate French Brownies don’t meet either of my personal brownie criteria, so judging them not as brownies, but as a delicious chocolate dessert, I really like them.

I followed the recipe as written with a slight baking variation. I did not place my pan on a baking sheet in the oven and I baked them using the convection fan which cooked them a little quicker. I would have like them a little less sweet and next time would use a 70% chocolate or cut back the sugar a touch. To tone down the sweetness, I dusted them with a Mayan spiced Valhrona cocoa powder that complemented the hint of cinnamon in the recipe and added a little chile kick as well.