Basic Hot Chocolate

Since I have already touched on a few different flavored hot chocolates, I wanted to put up some easy, basic hot chocolate recipes that work for everyone's taste buds!! So...we are going to try the simplest hot chocolate recipe three different ways: White, Milk, and Dark Chocolate! Same basic recipe, just change the chocolate you use and you have three astoundingly different flavors.

Basic Hot Chocolate

makes 1-2 cups

Milk: 3 oz

Chocolate[white, milk, or dark]: 1.5 oz

Hot Water: as needed to fill glass

1. Boil milk

2. Pour over chocolate

3. Fill cup to top with hot water!

Milk and chocolate together make....

HOT CHOCOLATE

[L to R] Dark, Milk, White

The white hot chocolate is sweeter than a normal hot chocolate [just like white chocolate is much sweeter than milk or dark] It is something that I think younger children would enjoy, not too rich and just tastes like a sweet milk drink- this would be a great medium for you to flavor and turn into a very interesting hot drink! [I probably will use white chocolate to make a caramel hot cocoa- so stay tuned for that one tomorrow!]

The milk chocolate makes hot cocoa that I find to be very mild- sweet and chocolatey. It is basically the average hot cocoa that everyone is used to- so its good for a plain drink!

The dark chocolate cocoa makes for a very rich flavor and is definitely not very sweet. It is definitely for a chocolate lover. If you want a really deep, chocolate, and not overly sweet flavor, then try the dark chocolate! This would probably be a great choice if you wanted to add some liquer to your cocoa- kahlua, bailey's, etc....a sweeter liquer would make the other two chocolates overly sweet.

Cranberry Cheesecake...

ALRIGHT! This will be the last cranberry post! [until we get closer to Thanksgiving]...because, well, I have used up almost all of the cranberries I have now. This bonbon is an ode to one of my favorite things: cheesecake [which as we learned last post, is a custard] So, to add a fun textural and flavor contrast, I made a white chocolate cream cheese ganache, and then topped it off with a cranberry gele [gel-ay] made using PECTIN. I explained to you before that pectin is a naturally occurring [in fruit] substance that causes gelling [similar to gelatin and agar, but with its own specific properties] pectin reacts with acid and heat and sugar, and creates beautiful and delicious geles! In the recipe that follows, you will need to use pectin to make this gele, but if you would like an alternative, I will be making a gele with gelatin sometime next week, and you can easily sub that in instead of this recipe *please note: this gele recipe is adapted from Chocolates & Confections by Chef Peter Greweling*
!

White Chocolate Cranberry Cheesecake Bites

Cream cheese ganache:

White chocolate: 290g

Cream cheese: 100g

Cranberry gele:

Cranberry puree: 80g

Apple sauce: 40g

Glucose syrup: 20g

Sugar: 10g

Pectin: 4g

Sugar: 120g

Glucose syrup: 35g

Lemon juice: 4g

1. Bring cranberries, apple sauce, and glucose to a boil.

2. sprinkle in 10g sugar and the pectin. Bring to a rapid boil stirring constantly

3.  Add in the remaining sugar and Glucose syrup and boil until it reaches 223 F, stirring constantly.

4. stir in the lemon juice.

Pour out into a "frame" that is lined with parchment paper. allow to set [1 hour or overnight in the fridge]

now start on the ganache...

1. Slowly melt the cream cheese over the stove, and bring to a boil. Cool to 105-110 F

2. Pour cream cheese into melted, tempered white chocolate and stir until homogeneous- pour out into frame on top of the cooled, set cranberry gele. allow to set 2 hours or over night.

When cooled, flip the frame, and cut into 1/2 inch squares, dip in dark chocolate, and sprinkle cinnamon on top :] 

pour out your cranberry gele and allow to cool before...

Making your cheesecake ganache and spreading it onto

Once set, flip the frame and cut, dip, sprinkle...

Enjoy!

Cappuccino Bonbons

 This is the recipe that started it all- all of this. I entered a recipe contest with this recipe, and ended up winning. it was the most amazing thing to ever happen to me, and was the best experience. It made me want to make more and more chocolate, and try new recipes and see if I could start to develop a whole collection of original recipes, so here we go :]
These "bonbons" have a bottom layer of dark chocolate espresso ganache and a top layer of white chocolate vanilla ganache. I specifically didn't call them "truffles" because from what I have been taught, you can only call it a truffle if it is round, because the original chocolate truffles were covered in chocolate and then dusted with cocoa powder, resembling truffles [like the earthy/mushroom truffles that cost a ridiculous amount of money and taste like dirt]. So since these weren't round, they became bonbons....the end.

White Chocolate Vanilla Ganache
Heavy Cream - 58g
Vanilla Bean - 2 ea
Coffee (whole beans) - 5g
Butter - 6g
White Chocolate (melted, tempered) - 158g
Method:
Bring cream, vanilla, and coffee beans to a boil, cover and steep for 5 minutes. Strain out the vanilla and coffee. Re-weigh the remaining cream, add more if there is not enough left.
Boil cream. Allow to cool to 105 F.
Pour over melted, tempered chocolate, mix slowly until homogonous.
Stir in softened butter.
Spread ganache onto a deep dish paper plate [or into an 8" cake pan that is lined with parchment paper]

Dark Chocolate Espresso Ganache
Heavy Cream - 58g
Coffee(coarsely ground) - 30g
Butter - 10g
Dark Chocolate (melted, tempered) - 135g
Method:
Bring cream and coffee to a boil, cover and steep for 5 minutes. Strain out the coffee grinds, and replace any evaporated cream with milk.
Boil cream. Allow to cool to 105 F.
Pour over melted tempered chocolate, mix slowly until homogenous.
Stir in softened butter.
Spread ganache on top of set white chocolate ganache.

Finishing:
Temper Dark Chocolate.
Spread a think, even layer over top of the Dark Chocolate Espresso Ganache.
Once set, flip the slab of ganache so the white chocolate is on top. Cut the ganache into  1/2" squares.
Using a dipping fork, dip the ganache centers in tempered Dark Chocolate. Once set, pipe diagonal stripes of tempered  White Chocolate across the chocolates.

bring cream to full boil

melted tempered chocolate and butter, read to stir in

finished, cappuccino bon bons :]

looking forward to working on some halloween [i.e. pumpkin] confections!