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Gingerbread, Raspberry, Chocolate

Posted onDecember 19, 2012 by     Leave a comment

The main difficulty with this recipe is that you need a Beloved to make the gingerbread, due to me being crap at baking – in this case, from Pru Leith’s Baking Bible. But any good version would do. The following should serve 4.

  •  Gingerbread
  • 1 Punnet raspberries
  • Sugar (about 40g plus little extra)
  • Good vanilla ice cream (Fedrici panna cotta is very good)
  • Double cream (80 ml)
  • Willie’s Cacao (60g), grated
  • 2 Knobs of butter

 

Put the raspberries into a small pan and add teaspoon of sugar (more if you have a sweet tooth!). Gently warm the raspberries, shaking the pan every now and then for about 10 minutes until pulped – work through a sieve with the back of a spoon, collecting the juice in a ramekin and remembering to scrape the pulp from the underside of the sieve. Clingfilm the ramekin and fridge.

Next, make a ‘truffle log’ of chocolate ganache: heat cream and sugar in a small pan, removing from the heat when nearly boiling. Add the chocolate and a knob of butter and stir until mixed (note: Willie’s Cacao is very bitter as it’s 100%, so the amount of sugar required is according to personal taste – I prefer it quite bitter against the sharp raspberries). If the mixture is a little too warm, it may split: just add a little more cream (cold) and whisk the mixture hard. It will recover – but your arm will need a rest!

The  ganache needs to set; you can pack it in clingfilm by sitting a layer of clingfilm in a double thickness of tin foil, to support the film, pouring the chocolate sauce in, wrapping over the clingfilm and then the foil. It can get a bit messy – but these are good-to-lick messy fingers. Transfer to fridge – check every 5 or 10 minutes as it will harden quickly. When still a little give, you can roll the whole thing on a hard surface to improve the shape.

This can be done 2-3 days in advance, if wished, keeping the prepared ingredients cold.

When ready to serve, boil a kettle and pour hot water into a mug – keep to one side. Put a knob of butter in a frying pan and sprinkle over a loose handful of sugar. Cut four slices of the gingerbread, not end pieces, and, when the butter mixture is bubbling, place them in the pan, freshly cut side down.

Meanwhile, on a plate, spread out a healthy teaspoon of the raspberry purée; cut three 3mm thick disks per person from the truffle log and place on the raspberry. Turn the gingerbread over to cook the other side (the pieces want about a minute or so per side, just to soak up the butter mixture, warm them through and give a slightly crisped edge). Dip a scoop or spoon in the hot water and dollop out one scoop per person of good vanilla ice-cream onto the plate, rinsing the utensil each time quickly in the hot water to help get the ice cream out – and give a nice sheen!

Place the gingerbread on the plate and serve immediately.

Gingerbread, Raspberry, Chocolate

(Apologies for the terrible picture!)

 

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