For some reason something went awry with the quantities and we ended up with a considerable amount of the filling left over after we had made our pithiviers, hence this potted version.

Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 30 – 35 minutes
Recipe: Simon Hopkinson
Serves: 8
Skill level: easy to medium

Ingredients

For the crème patissière

• milk – 250ml
• caster sugar – 75g
• 3 (free range) egg yolks
• plain flour – 25g
• 1 vanilla pod – cut lengthways

For the chocolatey bit

• unsalted butter – softened – 110g
• caster sugar – 110g
• 2 (small) eggs
• ground almonds – 110g
• cocoa powder – 50g
• plain chocolate – finely chopped – 110g
• dark rum – ½tbsp

First make the crème patissière:

Pour the milk into a saucepan along with the vanilla pod and gently heat to boiling point.

Whisk together the eggs yolks, sugar and flour.

Pour the hot milk over the egg mixture and whisk lightly together.

Return to the heat and cook gently until it thickens.

Pour through a sieve, ditch the vanilla pod and chill.

Next for the chocolatey bit:

Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

Add the eggs and beat together.

Next add the ground almonds and cocoa powder and beat together.

Now add the rum, crème patissière and chopped chocolate and fold everything together.

(if at this stage you want to make pithiviers, you’ll need to chill the mixture and find yourself a recipe for the pastry)

Spoon into ramekins and chill until ready to cook.

Preheat the oven to 190c/gas mark 5.

Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes or until they look cooked (use your instincts)

Serve.

Verdict: As you would expect from Simon Hopkinson, this was delicious and VERY rich. The almond and chocolate give a pleasing texture.

Drink: Beer, Cava, red, white, vodka and hot chocolate.

Entertainment: Browsing through ‘The International Male Magazine’ and ‘All-Rubber Slimming Wear’.

> View the whole filthy set

> View the whole filthy set

Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 12 minutes
Skill level: easy
Makes: about a dozen, plus lots of tasty trimmings

Ingredients

• butter – softened – 113g
• light brown sugar – 146g
• 1 egg – beaten
• plain flour – 128g
• baking powder – ½tsp
• vanilla extract – 1tsp
• chocolate chips (or chopped up chocolate) – 90g

Preheat your oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5.

Grease 2 baking sheets.

In a bowl beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Beat in the egg.

Mix the flour and baking powder together and then stir into the butter mixture.

Add the vanilla extract and stir.

Finally stir in the chocolate chips of your choice.

Spoon dollops of the mixture onto the baking sheets – leave plenty of room between them as they will spread considerably.

Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.

Leave to cool on a wire rack.

If you want a neater cookie, trim with a cookie cutter (and eat all the trimmings).

Verdict: Crunchy on the outside, chewy in the middle, chocolate throughout. Very good indeed.

Drink: Makes a good dunker.

Entertainment: Sitting on the sofa with a poorly Yumblog Junior watching ‘Timmy Time‘.

A belated Happy New Year to our reader(s).

Preparation time: 10 minutes plus 2 hours refrigeration time
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Skill level: Easy
Serves: We had it between the two of us over several evenings. In reality, this is so rich it would probably serve 6-8 people.

Ingredients

• milk – 360ml
• (good quality) dark, bitter chocolate – cut into chunks – 210g
• gelatine – 2 leaves
• 3 egg yolks
• double cream – 180ml

Put the gelatine leaves into a bowl, cover with cold water and set aside to soften.

Heat the milk, add the chocolate and stir until melted.

Whisk the egg yolks and add to the chocolate mixture.

Cook over a low heat until thickened to the consistency of custard.

Drain the gelatine and add to the chocolate mixture while it is still hot. Whisk thoroughly.

Pass the mixture through a sieve into a cold bowl.

Place over crushed ice and stir with a wooden spoon until it is starting to set.

NYE meal – A (very disappointing) trout mousse,
a spectacular deconstructed prawn vol-au-vent,
and this profoundly rich Simon Hopkinson chocolate mousse.
And thankfully no Jools Holland

Lightly whip the cream to soft peaks and then gently fold into the chocolate mixture.

Pour into individual ramekins or receptacles of your choice.

Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Serve (Simon Hopkinson suggests serving with cold crème anglaise)

Serving suggestion

Verdict: To quote ‘Guys n’ Dolls‘ 1974 No.2 smash hit ‘There’s a whole lot of loving’, this dessert is ‘…richer than a 49er miner striking lucky (he was never rich as me)’

Drink: Champagne, a bottle of white and no doubt a vodka and tonic to round off.

Entertainment: Fell asleep on the sofa but woke up just in time to see in the new year.

Blue spots = Lavender
‘Made from artisanal miel de lavande and lavender buds, a taste of summer.’

We are no strangers to this particular brand of hand-crafted chocolates as last year Blogger-D received a generously-sized box from her boss as part of her yuletide goodie bag. In fact so impressed were we that we hastened to the l’Artisan du Chocolat, handed over a considerable amount of money and left with the bulk of the Christmas presents given to yumblog family and friends.

Yellow spirals = Coriander praline
‘Hazelnuts with a citrus hint from crushed coriander seeds.’

Looking like exquisite little mosaic tiles, each chocolate is coded with a distinctive pattern to indicate which flavour from the extensive range of 45 lurks within. This smaller box doesn’t come with the booklet with the key to crack this code, so you can either download this chart or leave it to chance and try to guess which particular flavour it is you are sampling… not easy as the flavourings can be subtle as well as unusual.

Green Slashes = Moroccan Mint
‘An infusion of fresh Moroccan mint leaves. Reminiscent of the best mint teas.’

Incidentally, these chocolates arrived fresh and in perfect condition as Forman & Field had thoroughly packaged them in an ice-filled polystyrene cool box.

Forman & Field
Stour Road, Fish Island,
London E3 2NT
T: 020 8525 2352

* Bethnal Green was recently covered in the Guardian’s Weekend Magazine ‘Let’s move to’ feature. Full credit to the photographer for managing to find an angle of the High Street which didn’t contain the gaudy fascia of a fried chicken franchise.

Preparation time: 10 – 20 minutes
Cooking time: 2 hours
Skill level: easy
Makes: 30
Recipe: Dan Lepard

Ingredients

• dark chocolate – 200g
• the whites from 4 medium eggs
• caster sugar – 175g
• honey – 50g
• icing sugar – sifted – 100g
• flaked almonds (optional)

Start by pre-heating the oven to 140C/gas mark 1 and cover a baking tray with nonstick baking paper.

Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie and set to one side.

Put the egg whites in a large bowl and beat until stiff.

Add the sugar a third at a time and whisk on a high speed until smooth, glossy and very thick – the meringue mix should hold its shape.

Beat in the honey until just combined and then gently fold in the icing sugar.

Next gently fold in the chocolate without fully amalgamating it so you keep some streakiness.

Place small spoonfuls on the prepared tray (the meringues will go flat if too big)

Scatter with almonds (optional) and bake for about two hours.

Verdict: We served with a Greek yoghurt which was a nice sour note to offset the sweetness, very tasty and high fives all round (there was an American in the room).

Drink: A chilled dry red which went very well with the chocolate, again the dryness was a fine sweetness offsetter.

Entertainment: Endless gazing at our respective infants, ours naturally being the most perfect, beautiful, etc.

Preparation time: 15 minutes plus chilling time
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Skill level: so easy a child could do it
Makes: 30ish
Recipe: Jme

Ingredients

• butter – 140g
• caster sugar – 140g
• 2 egg yolks
• self-raising flour – 255g
• cocoa powder – 30g
• 30 squares of good quality chocolate (milk, white or plain)

Hi guys, for this recipe you’ll need two circular pastry cutters about 4cm and 5cm in diameter (or a pair of compasses, knife and steady hand)

Grease a large baking sheet.

Cream the butter and sugar together until creamed.

Beat in the egg yolks and then add the flour and cocoa powder to make a dough.

Turn out and knead and then put it into the fridge for a while to chill.

Preheat the oven to 190ºC/gas 5.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out about a third of the dough until thin, then cut out about 30 circles with the smaller cutter.

Spread them out on the baking sheet and put a square of chocolate in the middle of each one.

Then roll out the rest of the dough and cut out an equal number of circles with the larger cutter.

Lay over the top of the chocolate and press gently around the edge to seal and form your biscuit.

Cook in the preheated oven for 10 minutes

Eat them hot or cold.

Verdict: We filled ours with and an 85% cocoa plain chocolate, so the end result was a light crisp sweet biscuit with a dark moody sophisticated heart. Yum.

Drink: Best with a nice cup of tea.

Entertainment: Pretending that an eight-week old child had assisted in the preparation of the biscuits by sitting her in the kitchen and talking her through the process – Yumblog Junior will have to learn sometime and I’m sure she’ll have some residual memory of the food preparation we’ve been talking her through.

In our defence, this was our first attempt at such butter-rich chocolate-filled biscuits, so perhaps these errant little dainties were fashioned more by enthusiasm then precision. Don’t be fooled by appearances though, whatever shape they end up, these are guaranteed to be delicious.

Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 8 minutes
Skill level: pretty easy
Makes: 16

Ingredients

For the biscuits

• icing sugar – 100g
• softened butter – 100g
• vanilla extract – 1 tsp
• 2 large egg whites
• plain flour – 120g

For the ganache

• 70% cocoa plain chocolate – 90g
• double cream – 3 tbsp
• icing sugar – 1 tbsp

Start by preheating your oven to 200C (gas mark 6) and lining a baking sheet with non-stick paper.

Beat together the sugar, butter and vanilla until fluffy.

Next beat in the egg whites and then fold in the flour.

Spoon the mixture into a piping bag with a 1cm nozzle

Pipe the mixture on to the sheet, in 32 x 5cm fingers.

Bake for 6–8 minutes, until the edges are brown.

Leave to cool

For the ganache, break the chocolate into pieces and put it in a heat-proof bowl with the cream. Place the bowl over a pan of very hot water.

When the chocolate is half-melted, take the bowl off the pan.

Stir the chocolate until it has entirely melted and then beat the mixture as it cools.

Spread 1 tsp of ganache on a biscuit.

Place another biscuit on top, pressing down gently.

Repeat with the rest of the biscuits.

Leave in the fridge for an hour to set, then dust lightly with the icing sugar before serving.

Verdict: Velvety chocolate sandwiched between two butter-rich biscuits. Delicate and delish.

Drink: These go equally well with either a hearty red or a nice cup of tea.

Entertainment: The beautiful and touching ‘Let the Right One In‘ on DVD.

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Skill level: easy

Ingredients

• butter – 100 g
• plain flour – 175 g
• brown sugar – 75 g
• plain chocolate – 100 g – chopped
• cocoa powder – 75 g
• bicarbonate of soda – 1/2 tsp
• salt – pinch
• castor sugar – 75 g
• vanilla essence – few drops

Sift flour into a bowl. Add butter and cream the mixture. Add sugar. Add cocoa powder. Add chopped up bits of chocolate.

Taste some of the mixture and wonder if you really need to cook it. Form into little balls and place on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Dip a fork in hot water and make fork indentations on each biscuit – you can temper the biscuity/cakeyness at this stage – the flatter the biscuitier.

Bake at 190 C/gas mark 5 for ten minutes.

Set aside on grid to cool.

Eat.

Just the one.

Well another won’t hurt, etc…

Verdict: The people liked the chocolate biscuits, that’s a FACT.

Drink: A drop of red/some beer/some rose/some Cava/watered down juice for the littluns and tea for John’s Mum.

Entertainment: Small boy child having his birthday presents opened by slightly older girl child. Then another small child driving a child’s car thing back and forth at levels of repetition only tolerated by small children.