Cooking with fine chocolate (a call to arms)

I am often frustrated at the lack of options in desserts available with fine chocolate. Initially, I could eat desserts made from cheap chocolate, but it didn't last. The first type to go were the ones that touted their uber-chocolateyness - the Quintuple Chocolate Bypass, or the Chocolate Judge/Jury/Executioner. They were so chock-full of terrible chocolate that I couldn't help but taste it.

It wasn't long, though, before I started being able to taste the chocolate in much less overt chocolate desserts. Even chocolate ice cream turned on me - there was nowhere safe. At restaurants I would never chocolate ANYTHING anymore. I still rarely do.

At any rate, I have often tried taking matters into my hands. I have attempted a range of desserts including some form of fine chocolate, and I invite all aspiring cooks and bakers (or long-established ones) to try to figure out tasty and creative uses of fine chocolate.

I have tried pudding several times. My only complaint there is that I can never get the texture right - I always get some little (eggy?) lumps that I often strain out through some wire mesh. But pudding is a surprisingly effective vehicle for the flavors of chocolate. I once made some Amano Guayas pudding that had even chocolate newbies were asking me if there was any banana in it. I have used Pralus Djakarta (amazing), Domori Sur Del Lago and Apurimac, Valrhona Alpaco, and probably Tainori at some point, but I am not sure. Try it sometime - the flavors explode. Generally, warmer applications bring out the best of chocolate, but something about getting a mouthful all at once can make some crisp and cool pudding really come to life.

As a use for pudding, I must also mention my cream puffs. The puffs themselves are a breeze to make - check your Better Homes and Garden cookbook for the recipe I use, just make sure you wait at least 15 minutes before adding the egg. Let the puffs cool completely in open air helps the texture. Don't add the filling until as late as possible to keep the puffs and filling having distinctly different textures.

For the filling - whip some heavy cream with powdered sugar (use some vanilla bean innards, too, if you like. I let the chocolate do the talking). Use between 2-3 tablespoons of sugar per cup of cream depending on desired sweetness. Fold the pudding and whipped cream together gently and slowly - generally using only half the whipped cream at first. Spoon the mixture into a gallon ziploc bag and refrigerate till you need it (at least 15 minutes). Push the filling to one corner as best you can, twist off the top of the bag, snip a small corner of bag, poke holes in the puffs with a freshly sanitized pinky, and fill to overflowing. You will make friends with this one.

I have made truffle pies with Valrhona and Pralus. I have discovered something about Pralus: it is apparently very difficult to keep homogenous. It seems to want to separate and stay separated. Valrhona is your friend. I made truffles from a Valrhona truffle pie recipe once with some chopped red jalapeno mixed in. It was a hit.

I have used Valrhona bulk baking chocolate broken up in place of chocolate chips several times for cookies. It won't upset anyone.

One of the easiest and tastiest applications I have come across is melting down various chocolate and combining equal-double that amount of cream to the chocolate. Pour the ensuing mixture over a good eggy vanilla ice cream. I like a good French Vanilla, but my favorite in Utah is Homestyle Vanilla from Breyer's. For those in Texas, you can probably guess which ice cream to use. Hint: think gold rim and singing cow.

The call to arms: Whether you have any sway at a restaurant or in your kitchen, if you have thought about cooking with fine chocolate, give it a try. Remember that the fat content of the good stuff is often fairly different from the cheap stuff (Valrhona is probably the most similar, and I have seen it work better than some others). I would love to hear about the results. Naturally, I would love to taste the results even more. Please tell me how it turns out!

On Roast

I love Pralus's bars. I can spot his chocolate from a mile away by just the color and thickness of his 75% bars. Smelling his bars generally yields a rather faint aroma compared to many others (Chuao excepted). There is no vanilla; there is no fermenty funk as with Domori. But when you bite into his Madagascar (or Djakarta, or whichever), you are greeted with intense flavor.

Francois Pralus walks a fine line. I haven't come across another chocolatier that can roast beans so dark as Francois - or at least would ever dare to. Between the roast and the high cocoa content, Pralus can approach savory more than sweet.

When the high roast levels are paired with chocolate from places that have rather volcanic soil, the results are especially smoky. I made some hot cocoa with Djakarta that, upon first taste, tasted smoky. After having some other cocoas that were a bit sweeter (this was at a society meeting highlighting hot cocoa, of course), my Pralus cocoa tasted like licking a really delicious used fire pit.

Valrhona hides its characteristically French roast levels with a fair amount of vanilla (and lower percentages and extra cocoa butter). I enjoy Valrhona, but in a different way. The flavors are generally less complex, and the extra sugar and cocoa butter and vanilla yields a much sweeter experience. Try the Tainori, and the relevance will crystallize for you.

Italians, represented by Domori and Amedei, tend to lean more toward lighter roast. Their chocolates often have a "brightness" to them that the French rarely do. Certainly, they come across as a lot less "roasty."

Once upon a time, I was able to try test kitchen batches of Amano's then forthcoming Guayas - made with the Ecuadorian Nacional bean. I tried three roast levels, and I had a sort of Goldilocks experience. The too-light roast tasted underdeveloped and flat. The too-dark roast tasted like better-than-average charcoal (an exaggeration, I promise), but the just-right roast exploded with flavor. The green banana popped to the forefront, despite the fact that the beans were coarsely ground and roughly mixed with the sugar. It was altogether quite enlightening.

Roast is a key component in my personal tasting experience. Aside from vanilla and snap, roast is among the first factors that exposes the maker. Cook with French chocolate, and even if you never understood the roast level before, you will get it. In pastries or pudding, to my palate, higher roasts bring the chocolate out in the "mix." In audio, it is the equivalent to an instrument "cutting through the mix."

It is not a matter of which roast is the best, but one more disparity in which we can revel and explore.