National Chocolate Week!

It's a perfect excuse to indulge (not that I need one!). Some quality Grenada, nibalicious 60% dark chocolate bar , pack of delicious florentines , and all that washed down with a mug of hot chocolate. What more could one want?

Well, there is probably one thing - an indulgent chocolate sauce. I made some churros earlier on (even though they weren't that great), so all I needed was some dipping sauce. And, although these Thomas J. Fudge's Wondrous White Chocolate Florentines are already delicious (seriously, I need more of these in my life!), why not dip them in some more chocolate? After all, they're only covered on one side ;)


As part of 'Death by Chocolate' challenge, set by Thomas J. Fudge's to celebrate the National Chocolate Week, I prepared two delicious chocolate dips. Simple chocolate dipping sauce is so easy to make, but so adaptable you can easily add your own twist to it. I made kind of 'his' and 'her' option - one with a chilli kick, one with subtle hint of rose.






If you want to make your own chilli chocolate sauce, you'll need:

• 100 ml double cream
• 50 ml whole milk
• 3 tbsp golden syrup
• 100 g quality dark chocolate (I used 82% organic dark chocolate from The Grenada Chocolate Company, for its intense flavour and bitterness)
• 3 small dried chilli peppers 

• 100 ml double cream
• 3 tbsp rose water
• 100 g dark chocolate (not too bitter, otherwise the rose aroma won't come through)
• 2-3 tbsp golden syrup

*The above post was written in collaboration with Thomas J. Fudge's, who set up the 'Death by Chocolate' challenge and kindly supplied the ingredients.

In Poland, we call it "ciasto drożdżowe", which literally means "yeast cake". It's often made with variety of seasonal fruit, but the simplest version is a bread-style cake, simply topped with sweet crumble. For some reason I was craving it the other day, so I had a go at making it.

There are plenty of recipes for this online, but I used one from my 1980s "Contemporary Polish cuisine" cookbook, that I took from my mum some time ago.

Ingredients:

Cake:

Crumble: *

• 50 g flour
• 25 g butter
• 25 g icing sugar

*I halved the quantities originally shown in the book, as this made way too much crumble for the cake

Preparation:

Place the milk, yeast and 50 g flour in a large bowl and mix well to make a leaven. Cover with a cloth and leave in a warm place to prove for about an hour. 

Separate the eggs. Whisk the yolks with sugar and add to the leaven. Add the remaining flour and salt, and knead the dough. Towards the end of kneading add the melted butter - make sure you let it cool down slightly. Whisk the egg whites and gently knead together with your dough.

To prepare the crumble, knead all the ingredients together.

Place the dough in a greased baking tin, up to about half of the tin's height. Brush the top with beaten egg and sprinkle the crumble on top. Cover and leave to prove for further 30 minutes or so.

Bake in 180C for about 40 minutes.

The cake is not overly sweet, and has a bread-like texture - it's best eaten warm, and great with a spread of butter or jam.

To prepare a portion of syrup, simply slice a large onion and sprinkle with sugar, which will release the juices. Let it sit overnight.

In the morning you'll have a portion of clear syrup. Take a spoonful as needed for your cough and cold. 

It tastes quite nice and sweet, but keep in mind it does smell and taste of onions! Adam decided he didn't like it and spat his spoonful out - you can try keeping the nose closed while drinking it.