National Apricot Day: Chocolate Dipped Apricots

I love apricots, fresh or dried. They are one of my favorite fruits. So today in honor of National Apricot Day, here's a recipe for Chocolate Dipped Apricots. The brandy is optional and the type of chocolate you use will change the results.. maybe for the better. Who doesn't love chocolate dipped fruit? This is so simple and the chocolate dipped apricots will look and taste fabulous!

Chocolate Dipped Apricots
Makes About 40

1/2 cup broken pieces of a good dark chocolate (65% cacao or more)
1 1/2 tablespoons brandy (optional)
Dried apricots

Combine chocolate and brandy in top of double boiler and heat until melted and smooth.

Dip half of each apricot into chocolate and place on wax paper lined pan. Refrigerate one to two hours until chocolate is firm. Keep in a cool place.

English Toffee Day

Apparently January 8 is a world-wide holiday: English Toffee Day. I absolutely adore English Toffee, and one of my favorite English Toffees is made by See's Candies. They call it Victoria Toffee. I also like their Toffee-ettes. I first had English Toffee on the Boardwalk in Atlantic City. Don't ask! Yes, there was salt water taffy, but I was drawn to the English Toffee and White Chocolate. Both were rarities in our household, so they were special treats!

English Toffee has several definitions, but for me it's any confection made by boiling sugar with butter or milk, surrounded by chocolate and nuts. What's your definition? Some people call this brittle. Whatever it is, you have the hard, soft and chewy all in one.

The preparation for making English Toffee is much like that for making candy barks. English Toffee can be made with dark chocolate of varying amounts or even milk chocolate or a mixture of both. Nuts can range from almonds to peanuts to filberts to hazelnuts. Such a range. Every time you make English Toffee, you can vary the ingredients to come up with a completely different taste. How fun! One thing, though, be sure and use real butter!!! European butter is divine, but any good quality sweet butter will work.

I've slightly adapted this easy recipe from Epicurean. You will need a candy thermometer.

Ingredients:
1 cup unsalted butter (best quality)
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla (Madagascar)
6 oz semisweet or bittersweet chocolate (60% cacao or higher)
2 oz milk chocolate (40-55% cacao)
1/2cup finely chopped pecans,walnuts, filberts, or hazelnuts (you choose)
Directions:
Combine butter, sugar, water and salt in a heavy 2- 1/2 qt pan. Cook over medium-high to high heat, stirring often, until candy thermometer reads 305 degrees. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Immediately pour into heavily buttered 9-inch sq pan, spreading to fill pan. Cool completely.
Melt semisweet and milk chocolate in top of double boiler stirring until smooth. Spread half of chocolate over 1 side of toffee and sprinkle with half of nuts Refrigerate until chocolate is firm. Reheat remaining chocolate until flowing. Turn toffee over and spread other side with chocolate and sprinkle with remaining nuts. Refrigerate until firm. When chocolate is set, break toffee into pieces. Store in airtight container in a cool place.

Cooking for Engineers has another great and similar recipe with photos.

I'll be at the Fancy Food Show next week, and I'll bet there's a lot of English Toffee. There was last year. I'll be sure and report back which companies are making the best!

Chef Academy: Fricassee of Chicken with Chocolate

I'm a big fan of Bravo's Chef Academy, one of the latest cooking reality shows. On the show Chef Jean Christophe Novelli, world renowned Michelin chef has started a new Chef Academy in Santa Monica. In the show, he trains and 'transforms' 9 students who aspire to cook like professionals. He interviewed many possible students before coming up with an interesting assortment of types perfect for reality TV. There's a former male porn star now a graphic designer, an Orange County woman of 45 (remember Bravo has the Wives of Orange County reality show), a Navy submarine cook and a several others. Bravo's websites calls the participants Chefs; I call them students, and you can MEET THEM HERE.

Although I think Chef Novelli seems to be a very creative and excellent chef, I don't care for his interpersonal teaching skills. Perhaps he's great at showing how to cook and bake, and I must say I've learned a bit from even the abbreviated technique segments we see on the show. As a former teacher; however, I take offense at his mocking and often mean-spirited interactions with his students. They're all there to learn, they're all adults. Perhaps the fact that he hasn't reduced every student to tears (there have been a few) is positively miraculous. If someone passes, why spend 1-2 minutes teasing him and intimating that he didn't pass? Glad he's not my teacher. But I must remember this is theatre, and what makes for good theatre? Tension. So there's tension between the chef and the students, and among the students themselves. It makes for great TV, so as a television show, it's highly entertaining.

Since Chef Academy is listed as Season I on the Bravo website, I can only assume that Bravo plans another Season. I'll watch it. I'm sure there will be an equal amount of drama between the new students and Chef Novelli, and maybe I'll learn a little more about culinary techniques. To watch videos and clips of Chef Academy, go to the Bravo website, HERE.

This week the students tackled meat. I really loved the Chicken with Chocolate recipe. I didn't remember it being called a Fricassee, but of course that's what it is and what it says on the Bravo recipe website. When Chef Novelli first mentioned chicken and chocolate, I thought he'd be making a mole. Wrong culture--this is nothing like a mole.

Bravo's recipe website mavens give this recipe a moderate rating, and having watched the demo with Chef Novelli (although this isn't a cooking show a la Julia Child), I think it's fairly easy to reproduce. The fact that you never taste the foods on any of these cooking shows is especially hard for me in this one since he's teaching technique. Chef Novelli is always critiquing the student dishes, and I'm sure they're following directions, but with differing success. I watch most of the cooking shows on PBS, the Food Network, and it really depends on the slant of the writers/producers. I think Chef Academy is all about the personalities, but since I like reality shows, I'm o.k. with this.

Chef Novelli spends time critiquing the students sauces and dishes, so I'm not sure I'll reproduce this Chicken with Chocolate recipe to Chef's taste. The recipe on the Bravo Website is for 2 portions, so if you're entertaining, you'll have to adjust. That's not a matter of just doubling the recipe. That's where a bit of knowledge will help.

Being a chocolate maven, I can tell you to use the highest quality cocoa. Sweetened or unsweetened isn't mentioned, so I think it's a matter of taste. I would use sweetened, but that's me. I'll bet Chef Novelli is using unsweetened since there's sugar in the wine. For a list of some good quality cocoas, go here.

Fricassee of Chicken with Chocolate

Ingredients
4 Chicken legs - corn fed, organic or free range
2 Med sliced onions
1 tablespoon Cumin seeds
1 tablespoon Cocoa powder
1 tablespoon Smoked paprika
4 Garlic cloves
1 Sprig thyme
2 Bay leaves
1 Chicken stock cube
1 x 75cl Red wine- Merlot is preferred
Plain flour
White sugar
Sea salt and pepper
Extra virgin olive oil

Directions

1. Divide the chicken legs in half through the natural joint. Do this without splintering the bones.

2. Season with salt and pepper and dust with paprika. Add enough olive oil to coat and leave to infuse for at least 1 hr.

3. Heat a heavy based pan up and then carefully place in the pieces of chicken add the bay leaf and thyme and garlic.

4. Fry on both sides until golden and evenly colored. Remove from the pan with the herbs and garlic.

5. Add the sliced onions to the pan and sweat down until soft, add the cocoa powder and mix in.

6. Return the chicken pieces and herbs etc. and combine.

7. Sprinkle enough flour to absorb any fat residue and form a basic roux.

8. Stir in the wine and ensure there are no lumps and the sauce is just thickened.

9. Adjust the acidity of the wine with a little sugar.

10. Crumble in the chicken stock cube.

11. Bring to the simmer and remove any impurities that rise to the surface.

12. Place the lid on and cook in the oven for approximately 45-60 minutes.

Recipe from Food by Bravo site HERE.

National Shortbread Day: Make them Chocolate

Today is National Shortbread Day, and, of course, it's always great to eat Chocolate Shortbread.

If you're looking to buy a good chocolate shortbread cookie, you should definitely try the Spicy Chocolate or Chocolate Espresso shortbread cookies from Emily's Biscuits & Cookies. These wonderful butter cookies have great flavor and texture, and they are nut and egg free. Emily has designed her cookies to pair with lots of foods besides milk including cheese and wine.

If you haven't discovered Rechiutti Confections, you're not reading this Blog. I love Michael's chocolates, blog and recipes. There's a recipe on the website for Chocolate Truffle Shortbread Cookies. These are absolutely fabulous. They're a bit time consuming, but it's well worth it.

Michael Rechiutti hails from Philadelphia, as do I, and he was the pastry chef at The Frog Commissary. I'm sure I must have had some of his desserts when I was in Philadelphia. We're both now in the Bay Area, and although you can get Rechiutti Chocolate at many fine chocolate shops and online, it's fun to pop into the Recchiuti Store at the Ferry Building. We include Rechiutti on our San Francisco Chocolate Tours.

Chocolate Truffle Shortbread Cookies

THE COOKIES
1 cup (5 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon (1 ½ ounces) unsweetened natural cocoa powder
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
8 tablespoons (4 ounces) unsalted butter with 82% butterfat, at room temperature
½ cup (3 ½ ounces) granulated cane sugar
¼ teaspoon pure vanilla extract, preferably Madagascar Bourbon

THE FILLING
4 ounces 65% chocolate, roughly chopped
1/3 cup (2 ½ ounces) heavy whipping cream
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon (1 ½ ounces) powdered cane sugar
2 tablespoons (1 ounce) unsalted butter with 82% butterfat, very soft (75°F°)
1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract, preferably Madagascar Bourbon

Unsweetened natural cocoa powder for finishing cookies

These shortbread rounds are sandwiched with truffle cream made the old-fashioned way: by pouring hot cream over chopped chocolate. It creates a stiff filling that can support the top cookie in the sandwich.

Helpful hints from Michael Recchiuti: Contrary to many recipes that call for creaming together butter and sugar until fluffy, this method instead beats these ingredients until they are just combined. Overmixing beats in excess air, resulting in cookies that spread too much in the oven. The dough needs to rest for at least 3 hours in the refrigerator, so you will need to plan ahead. The cookies can be baked up to 4 to 5 days in advance, however, and stored in an airtight container. Assemble the sandwiches shortly before serving and keep them in a cool place before taking them to the table.

Make the dough:
Sift the flour, cocoa powder, and salt together into a bowl. Set aside.

Put the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed just until combined. Add the vanilla extract.

Switch the mixer to low speed and add the dry ingredients in 3 additions, pulsing the mixer to incorporate each addition before adding the next one. The dough will look dry.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface. Knead a few times just until it comes together. Flatten into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate until firm, at least 3 hours or up to 2 days.

Bake the cookies:
Preheat the oven to 325°F. Line the bottoms of two 12-by18-inch sheet pans with parchment paper.

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and unwrap it. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the dough 1/8 inch thick. Using a 1 ½ inch round cookie cutter, set out as many rounds as possible. Reroll the scraps only once, using less flour on the work surface to prevent toughness, and cut again. You should have 60 rounds in all. Place the rounds on the prepared pans, spacing them ½ inch apart.

Bake on the middle shelves of the oven, rotating the pans 180 degrees halfway through the baking time, until the tops are lightly cracked and hold a slight indentation when pressed with a fingertip, about 10 minutes. Let cool completely on the pans on wire racks.

Store in an airtight container at room temperature until you are ready to assemble the sandwiches.

Make the filling and assemble the cookies:
Put the chocolate in a medium bowl.

Put the cream and powdered sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Cook at a simmer for 1 minute and remove from the heat.

Pour the hot cream mixture over the chocolate. Whisk the mixture by hand until the chocolate melts. Whisk in the butter, and then the vanilla extract.

Pour the truffle cream into a bowl, cover with plastic wrap so that the wrap is touching the surface, and refrigerate until the consistency of thick mayonnaise, 30 to 45 minutes.

Arrange half of the cookies, bottom side up, on a sheet pan. Put the truffle cream into a pastry bag fitted with a ¼-inch star tip and pipe a swirl of the cream onto the top of each cookie, distributing the cream evenly among them. Top each covered cookie with a second cookie, bottom side down, and press gently to adhere it to the truffle cream. Store in a cool place until serving.

Just before serving, sift a dusting of cocoa powder on the tops of the cookies. Transfer to a serving plate.