Tuesday 15 January 2013

Weird chocolate pudding

I made this, and the family enjoyed it, but I shall be experimenting with variations.
I have been searching for for a self-saucing chocolate pud for years.  Mum used to make one in a soufflé dish and it was delicious.  Well I'm pretty sure this recipe isn't the same, the main giveaway being that it isn't cooked in a soufflé dish, so I'm still looking.
This is a stir some stuff, chuck some other stuff in and bung it in the oven recipe.  Easy peasy.  Serves six.
Ingredients
  • 150g plain flour
  • 2tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon (optional)
  • 1/4 tsp chilli powder (optional)
  • 200g caster sugar
  • 50g cocoa
  • 125ml milk (any variety)
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
  • 4 tbsp corn oil
  • 100g dark brown sugar (can be substituted with another type of sugar)
  • 60ml rum (optional but if omitted then substitute with boiling water or other liquid)
  • 175ml freshly boiled water
Method
  • Pre-heat the oven to 180°C (160°C for fan oven) and butter a two litre oval oven proof dish.
  • In a large bowl, stir the flour, baking powder, bicarb, salt, cinnamon, chilli powder, caster sugar and half of the cocoa.
  • Beat the milk, vanilla extract and corn oil together in a jug or bowl and then pour this into the dry ingredients.  
  • Mix it together with with a wooden spoon to make a thick, smooth batter.  
  • Spoon into buttered oval dish and it should look like this.
IMG 5800
  • Combine remaining 25g cocoa and dark brown sugar in another bowl giving it a good stir to eliminate any lumps.
  • Sprinkle this over the batter on the dish.  You can see my lump elimination efforts were flawed.
IMG 5802
  • Poor freshly boiled water on top followed by the rum.  This seems completely bonkers but you just need to have faith.
IMG 5803
  • Then pop in the oven for 30 mins.
  • When it emerges from the oven it hasn't turned into anything particularly beautiful but it is tasty.
IMG 5804
  • I know Mary Berry doesn't approve of soggy bottoms but this is more gooey than soggy and can be served with cream, ice cream or mascarpone.  Custard doesn't really work. 
I'm never really a fan of vanilla or cinnamon with chocolate and I have to be in the right mood for chilli with chocolate.  I think this would be delicious with orange zest and orange juice instead of rum.  I also think it could be very tasty without the cinnamon, chilli and vanilla and even the rum.  Another alternative could be to take away all of the optional stuff and use coffee liqueur or strong coffee instead of rum.

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