The Munchies Blog

I’ve wanted to make panna cotta ever since I first tasted it. My only problem with the recipe I had was that it requires gelatin, which I do eat but prefer to avoid in my own cooking. Fortunately, I recently spotted an Agar-based gelatin replacement in a local supermarket, so I decided to give it a try.

Panna cotta as I know it is usually served with berry compote. Unfortunately, it isn’t exactly berry season at the moment. I was thinking about using frozen berries, but then I remembered the blood oranges that were lying around in the kitchen and decided to go for blood orange sauce instead.

The panna cotta turned out really well, and the combination with the blood oranges proved to be a good one. As usual with panna cotta, everyone would have liked larger servings (knowing full well it was better for them that they didn’t get more). The fruit sauce itself was so nice that people finished off the sauce leftovers with the rest of the grated white chocolate.

Vegetarian Panna Cotta
5 servings of 100 ml each

• 200 g cream (30% fat)
• 300 ml milk (3.2% fat)
• gelatin replacement (or gelatin) for 500 ml liquid
• 1 vanilla pod
• 50 g sugar
• pinch of salt

Pour the cream and milk into a small saucepan. Slit open the vanilla pod lengthwise and scratch out the seeds. Put the seeds and the pod into the saucepan. Stir in the sugar. Refer to the gelatin replacement’s packaging for usage instructions and use accordingly. The stuff I had could just be stirred into the mixture (the only requirement was that it had to boil for at least 2 minutes). Bring the mixture to a simmer and let it simmer for some 15 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Prepare 5 small molds (capacity 100 ml) by washing them out with cold water (I’m not sure why this step is required, but my original recipe included this. It might make it easier to flip the panna cotta out of the molds before serving). Fill the cream mixture into the molds, let cool down a bit, then refrigerate for at least 2 hours, better overnight.

Take the panna cotta out of the fridge about an hour before serving. Flip them out of the molds if you like (I didn’t). Serve with (warm or cold, I used warm) blood orange sauce and grated white chocolate (from about 15 g white chocolate).

Blood Orange Sauce
enough for 5 servings and some leftovers

• 5 blood oranges
• 1/2-1 Tsp sugar
• 2 tsp cornstarch

Put the orange juice and pulp into a small saucepan. Stir in the sugar and the starch and bring to a simmer. Let simmer for a few minutes. Taste and add more sugar if required. I had added too much sugar and tried to rescue things with about a teaspoon of lemon juice. I don’t think that made any difference though.

I just found a not-quite-serious Periodic Table of Desserts — “A Scientific and Rigorous approach to patisserie — in Full Color”.

That page also has links to flavor wheels to describe the taste of several foods and drinks, for example beer, wine, coffee, cheese, chocolate and, of all things, maple products.

On a related note: I just added Cooking for Engineers to our link section. The recipes there are written in a fairly “scientific” way, with pictures of the ingredients as well as of the finished food. One special thing on the site is the special tabular recipe layout (”patent pending”). This is difficult to describe, so head over and check it out, for example on today’s “Recipe File of the Day”, Simple Tiramisu.

Katrin sent in a picture of “Les Munchies”, a place in downtown Bath that sells baguettes, bagels, sandwiches and ciabattas. At least according to its signs; Katrin hasn’t tried it (yet).

There is another place in Bath called “Munchies” (at the uni), but as it seems to be fairly horrible, we won’t speak of it again here ;)

Today, I decided to try a variation of my normal chili recipe. This chili is supposed to be soup-like in consistency. It turned out quite nice, just a wee bit too hot. I added hot paprika powder in addition to the spices mentioned, and I think that was a mistake.

Several pages on the Internet mention the use of bittersweet chocolate or unsweetened cocoa powder in chili con carne, so I decided to try that as well. I don’t think the taste is really noticeable in this quantity (might use more next time), but at least I didn’t have any problems getting the chili to taste really nice this time.

About 4-6 servings

• 250g minced beef (soy protein probably works as well)
• 1 capsicum (a.k.a. bell pepper or paprika) — I used a yellow one, but that shouldn’t make a difference
• 1-2 chili peppers — I used a green one
• 1 large red onion
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1-2 tsp vegetable stock powder
• 500 ml puréed tomatos
• ca. 750 ml (hot) water
• 1 can of kidney beans
• 1 small can of corn (optional — drain and add together with the spices)
• spices to taste (I used salt, pepper, cumin, sweet paprika, cayenne pepper, 2 small dried chopped chilis, allspice, cinnamon, thyme and 1/2 tsp of unsweetened cocoa powder)
• 1 tsp semolina

Wash, cut and seed the capsicum and the chili pepper(s). Peel the onion and cut in half rings. Peel the garlic.

Heat a tablespoon of butter in a medium-sized saucepan on medium heat. Throw in the minced meat. Stir the meat so that it doesn’t clump together. When the meat is done, add the onion and the pressed garlic. Stir and fry this for a few more minutes until the onions start to become transparent. Throw in the capsicum and chili pepper(s), and again stir and fry for a few more minutes.

Add the water, stock powder and puréed tomatos and stir well. When the chili is boiling, turn down the heat a bit and add the spices, then let the chili simmer for some 5-10 minutes. In the meantime, drain and wash the beans. Don’t hurt yourself with the can opener. When the chili has simmered for some 5-10 minutes, add the beans.

Wait some 5 more minutes and add the semolina. This is not strictly necessary, but it does give the chili a nicer consistency. This is also a good time to sample the chili and add any missing spices. Let simmer for some 5 more minutes.

Serve with sour cream, crème fraîche or yoghurt for those who don’t like their chili too hot and with slices of white bread (for example ciabatta, baguette or pide).

One thing to visit when you’re in Cologne is, of course, its famous Cathedral.

But as this is a foodblog, even the most impressive Gothic architecture is more than slightly off-topic. What’s more interesting in this context is that Cologne also has a chocolate museum.

One part of the museum shows the process of making chocolate, from the cocoa plants to various cocoa-based products. This includes a small greenhouse (which you can safely leave out if you’ve ever been to a greenhouse before). Another part shows historic devices used for chocolate consumption — mainly mugs and bowls from the Maya, Aztecs and Olmecs and special chocolate pots (like a teapot, just for chocolate) and cups from the 18th century.

The part I personally like best is the working chocolate production area. In this area, you can watch (and smell!) chocolates being made. There also is a chocolate fountain where they hand out small waffle pieces dipped in warm chocolate. I remember that on my first visit to the museum (I must have been around 14), my best friend and I swapped jackets after getting waffle pieces for the second time whithin 5 minutes because we thought they then wouldn’t remember us when we came back for a third time…

The last time I was there, they also had a temporary exhibition on the history of associating chocolate with erotic settings (like in Baroque paintings), which was fairly interesting (and perfectly family-safe, in case you’re wondering).

Officially called "Imhoff-Stollwerck-Museum" after the chocolate manufacturer Stollwerck, a large part of the exhibition areas has a strong focus on the products and the history of this company. This includes chocolate advertisements from the 19th and 20th century and some old chocolate vending machines. While these might be interesting for some visitors, they take away space that could have been dedicated to — exactly, chocolate ;) Together with the rather high entrance fees (currently, 6 € for adults and 3.50 € for students etc.), this left me slightly disappointed. Parts of the museum just feel more like an interactive advertisement for Stollwerck than like a place to learn more about chocolate.

Even if you’re not interested in the museum itself, it might be worthwile to go there: The museum’s shop (accessible without paying entrance fees) has a nice assortment of chocolate and usually also an interesting assortment of confused tourists from various countries. Be prepared to leave some money there — the prices are normal compared to other shops, but if you’re like me, there are just so many things you want to have ;)

The chocolate museum is located on an artificial peninsula in the Rhine (map) and can easily be reached on foot from the cathedral by walking southwards along the Rhine for some 15 minutes.

(Don’t know what the “Part II” is about? Go and read Part I.) The original recipe uses

• 400g good quality dark chocolate,
• 20cl whipping cream and
• 40g butter.

I decided to use half the amount of chocolate and went for a large (250g) bar of Rausch Amazonas (60% cocoa solids) minus some six pieces. I then followed the recipe, breaking the chocolate apart (I was lazy and only broke off the pieces, which I regretted later because the chocolate took quite long to melt), bringing the cream (30% fat whipping cream) almost to a boil, pouring the cream over the chocolate and finally mixing in the diced butter.

I used crushed butter cookies (Butterkeks), chocolate granules (Schokostreusel, like these), unsweetened cocoa powder and icing sugar (Puderzucker) for the toppings.

As mentioned in Part I, I used cayenne pepper, cinnamon, a sweet masala mixture from the organic supermarket, vanilla and salt (fleur de sel, to be exact) for flavouring the ganache itself. I can’t really say anything about the amounts I used; it was pretty much “use what feels right”.

And here’s the summary:
I think the truffles would be nicer with slightly less dark chocolate. Next time I’ll try Rausch Santo Domingo with 55% cocoa solids.

Toppings:

Flavorings:

After stumbling over (and spending some hours reading) the really nice foodblog Chocolate & Zucchini yesterday, I decided to try out her recipe for Chocolate Truffles.

As usual with chocolate, I had this strong urge to play with spices. So now our fridge looks a bit like the mad scientist’s lab in a bad movie: small bowls with a little bit of chocolate in each, carefully wrapped in plastic foil, with small labels on them (”Vanilla”, “Cayenne Pepper”, “Salt”, “Sweet Masala”, “Cinnamon”).

Results tomorrow.