Whenever I invite people round for dinner I always ask my husband for his input into the menu. I don't know why - he can't cook (apart from toast) and he pretty much always answers with the same dish - garlicky creamy chicken with rosemary roast potatoes.
Pudding is harder -I like desserts but I lose interest after two courses (and accompanying wine) and usually enthusiastically up take any offer of a gift of dessert from any guest foolish enough to vocalise it.
Recently we had some friends coming round and since I had been tasked with creating a chocolate dipping sauce to accompany some Thomas J Fudge's mouthwatering milk chocolate florentines I decided to bite the bullet, turn down my friends offer to bring pudding and actually make something. It turned ou quite well so I decided to share my simple but tasty pud.
I have to confess, I cheated a little bit. Well a lot. My 17-year-old son makes yummy chocolate brownies so I begged him to make a batch for me. That took a lot of the work out of making my third course!
I bought strawberries and made a chocolate dipping sauce to dip them in.
I started by melting 100g of good quality organic dark Madagascar chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water (you must be careful to not get water IN the chocolate as it will go a bit weird.) You can use a microwave to gently melt chocolate but be careful not to overheat.
I added a TBSP of salted caramel cream liqueur then tasted it. Then added sugar. Yes, quite a lot of sugar - about 4 tablespoons as since I was busking the recipe I had to fix what was turning into an incredibly bitter sauce. I checked the chocolate wrapper - ah. It was 100% cocoa. That would explain it. Next time I would use chocolate with around 70% cocoa content and ditch the sugar!
I added 2 TBSPS double cream and dipped strawberries for garnishing the brownies which I topped with a trimmed then sliced/fanned strawberry. This was topped with one of the gorgeous (and quite large) Thomas J Fudge's florentines. The sliced strawberry underneath the florentine tilted it to make the dessert more attractive as well as adding a freshness to slice through the sickly chocolate flavour.
I drizzled more cream onto the plate and served - it went down very well!
Disclaimer: I was sent a pack of Thomas J Fudge florentines and three bars of chocolate to create this dessert. Views and opinions remain honest and my own.
Pudding is harder -I like desserts but I lose interest after two courses (and accompanying wine) and usually enthusiastically up take any offer of a gift of dessert from any guest foolish enough to vocalise it.
Recently we had some friends coming round and since I had been tasked with creating a chocolate dipping sauce to accompany some Thomas J Fudge's mouthwatering milk chocolate florentines I decided to bite the bullet, turn down my friends offer to bring pudding and actually make something. It turned ou quite well so I decided to share my simple but tasty pud.
I have to confess, I cheated a little bit. Well a lot. My 17-year-old son makes yummy chocolate brownies so I begged him to make a batch for me. That took a lot of the work out of making my third course!
I bought strawberries and made a chocolate dipping sauce to dip them in.
I started by melting 100g of good quality organic dark Madagascar chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water (you must be careful to not get water IN the chocolate as it will go a bit weird.) You can use a microwave to gently melt chocolate but be careful not to overheat.
I added a TBSP of salted caramel cream liqueur then tasted it. Then added sugar. Yes, quite a lot of sugar - about 4 tablespoons as since I was busking the recipe I had to fix what was turning into an incredibly bitter sauce. I checked the chocolate wrapper - ah. It was 100% cocoa. That would explain it. Next time I would use chocolate with around 70% cocoa content and ditch the sugar!
I added 2 TBSPS double cream and dipped strawberries for garnishing the brownies which I topped with a trimmed then sliced/fanned strawberry. This was topped with one of the gorgeous (and quite large) Thomas J Fudge's florentines. The sliced strawberry underneath the florentine tilted it to make the dessert more attractive as well as adding a freshness to slice through the sickly chocolate flavour.
I drizzled more cream onto the plate and served - it went down very well!
Disclaimer: I was sent a pack of Thomas J Fudge florentines and three bars of chocolate to create this dessert. Views and opinions remain honest and my own.