Friday, February 19, 2010

Recipe 1-San Gines

Last night I made a triple batch of hot chocolate for a dinner party in Bolinas. The chocolate was served with rum, freshly whipped cream and Mexican Wedding Cookies. Mmmm mmm good! Two of the dinner guests originally declined the offer of hot chocolate--until they heard the oohs and aahs from fellow diners and saw that the cups held something significantly different from the expected anemic cocoa powder. A few tense moments followed when folks thought they would have to share their chocolate, but I was able to produce two more cups and diffuse the situation.

I use the San Gines recipe, modified (see my notes below).

Chocolate a la Taza
Chocolateria San Gines, Madrid, Spain
1/2 cup whole milk
1/4 cup heavy cream
4 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 teaspoon cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

In a non-reactive saucepan, combine the milk and cream and heat over medium-low heat until very hot but not boiling. Gradually add the chocolate to the hot liquid, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon until the chocolate is completely melted and the mixture is smooth. In small cup, dissolve the cornstarch in a few tablespoons of water. Add the dissolved cornstarch to the chocolate mixture and stir constantly until it is almost as thick as a pudding. Serve immediately in warmed cups.

Makes demitasse servings.

Tina's Notes:

I prefer to use El Rey Gran Saman 70% chocolate. I find the chocolate melts beautifully, thickens nicely without cornstarch and has good flavor. But it's fun to experiment with other varieties and percentages of chocolate (which I will do and report on in future blogs). Sometimes Whole Foods sells the El Rey in discs, which saves the step of having to chop the chocolate. Sometimes I add different flavored chocolates, too, such as mint or orange. For Valentine's Day this year, I added some homemade Rosemary Caramel Sauce (another incredibly yummy recipe!).

You'll note the San Gines recipe calls for vanilla in the ingredients, but doesn't say where to add it. A typo in the book, I imagine. The best time to stir in the vanilla is after you've removed the chocolate from the heat.

Because salt enhances flavors, some people--yours truly included--like to add a pinch to their chocolate. I use vanilla salt, and usually do not add vanilla at the end.

I also have not been adding the cornstarch, since the El Rey thickens up enough for my tastes--not pudding-like, but rich enough to still consume with a spoon. When I do choose to add a thickener, I prefer using Arrowroot, since it doesn't impart an after-flavor, like cornstarch does. Most importantly, if you let the chocolate rest awhile before reheating and consuming it, the texture will become even more velvety and thick.

Enjoy!
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Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Cocoa vs the Real Deal

Before I get too far with my research and blogging, I should explain the difference between hot cocoa and hot chocolate, because they are two very different beverages, and what I am obsessed with is the latter.

All too often hot cocoa is erroneously referred to as hot chocolate, which is an insult to the real thing. Hot cocoa consists of cocoa powder (the non-fat components of chocolate) and a sizable amount of sugar, usually pre-packaged and mixed into heated milk or water. It is often pale in appearance and equally pale in flavor. Many of us grew up drinking hot cocoa on chilly winter days, with soft white marshmallows floating on top often being as appealing as the beverage itself.

Hot chocolate, on the other hand, is more than a mere drink to warm you up on cold afternoons. Premium-quality dark or bittersweet chocolate is chopped or shaved and gently melted into milk and/or cream that has been heated to just below the simmering point. A good hot chocolate is silky and seductive, its appearance and flavor dark and rich. Savor hot chocolate slowly, letting the complexity of tastes delight your tastebuds. 

Dark chocolate is also abundant in antioxidants, so consider it a health drink. At the very least, it's almost guaranteed to make you smile!

Next up, the San Gines recipe, and more on chocolate itself.
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Sunday, February 14, 2010

The Obsession

My relationship to hot chocolate changed dramatically during a visit to Spain in 2002, where my husband Mark and I made a pilgrimage to the famed Chocolateria San Gines in Madrid. Open only from late afternoon to about 6:00 in the morning, San Gines has been serving cups of chocolate and cinnamon-sugar-dusted fried dough since 1894 to inebriated Madrilenos and tourists attempting to clear their heads after a night of revelry.

At 3:00 AM, we were on the early--and sober--side of visiting the cafe. The cups of beverage that arrived at our marble-topped table were unlike anything we'd ever experienced. The chocolate was so thick and pudding-like, we stood our spoons upright in them, wondering how long it would take for the utensils to topple over (our desire to devour the chocolate prevented us from ever finding out). And the flavor was so intense, so dark, we had to add sugar cubes to our cups. No Swiss Miss, this!

That evening sparked an obsession with finding and recreating a comparable drinking chocolate at home. A few years after returning to San Francisco, I discovered the San Gines recipe in a fantastic little book entitled Hot Chocolate by Michael Turback and I have been making this divine drink for Mark and me on a weekly basis since, often amending the recipe with orange or mint or rosemary flavors. However, my desire to find a cafe or restaurant in the Bay Area that serves a hot chocolate as good what I make at home or what I tasted in Spain hasn't abated. Each time I see the beverage offered on a menu, I ask "How do you make your chocolate?" "You're going to be disappointed," Mark warns me. But I order it, and most often, he's right. Still, I try.

After being served a truly terribly tasteless and watery beverage at an otherwise wonderful restaurant recently, I decided to become systematic in my search and to blog my results, for those who might share my passion or are simply curious. And what better day to start a blog about chocolate, and by someone named Valentine, than on February 14th (although if I don't post this soon, it's going to be February 15th, and I'm going too tired to do any real work in the office tomorrow, and my blogging career will end before it even really begins).

So, welcome to My Chocolate Valentine. I'm making this up as I go along, but the plan so far is to visit cafes, chocolatiers, restaurants and basically anywhere in the Bay Area (and beyond--wherever our travels take us) where I think there's a reasonable chance of sampling a decent cup of chocolate. My reporting will include comments not only on flavor, but also texture, appearance and aroma, as well as the ambiance and service of the establishment. I will also lace my probably-weekly blogs with recipes, pictures, and notes about my own experiments in hot chocolate-making. I welcome suggestions of places to visit and recipes to try.

Until the next posting, later this week, Sweet Dreams!


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