Chocolate Cake w/ Chile & Espresso inspired by Chocolat

"Once upon a time, there was a quiet little village in the French countryside, whose people believed in Tranquilité - Tranquility. If you lived in this village, you understood what was expected of you. You knew your place in the scheme of things. And if you happened to forget, someone would help remind you. In this village, if you saw something you weren't supposed to see, you learned to look the other way. If perchance your hopes had been disappointed, you learned never to ask for more. So through good times and bad, famine and feast, the villagers held fast to their traditions. Until, one winter day, a sly wind blew in from the North..."

Ready, Steady, Cook Challenge: Dessert Apricot Ice Cream spiked w/ Cinnamon & Chile and Chickpea & Apricot Thumbprints

Well....I'm up to the final course in my Ready, Steady, Cook! Challenge menu- Dessert!  And no...I did NOT work green beans into my dessert.  This ice cream sandwich was big enough to split down the middle and share...but you could have made smaller cookies...or eaten the whole thing by yourself.  I mean, you could even just scoop the ice cream into a bowl and eat the cookies on the side if you so desire...I just wanted it this way.  These thumbprints were inspired by the Mantecadas I made recently for my Big, Fat Puerto Rican meal!

Apricot Ice Cream spiked with Cinnamon & Chile

yield: just under a quart

4 eggs

1/2 c. sugar

2 c. milk

1/2 c. Apricot Jam (see Main Course...made enough for both)

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

1 tsp. chipotle chile powder

Beat eggs and sugar until thick and creamy.

In a small heavy saucepan over low to medium-low heat, add milk. Slowly bring milk just to a gentle simmer or until it begins to bubble around the edges. Remove from heat.

Gradually whisk scalded milk into egg mixture....a bit at a time at first to temper it.  Pour it back into the saucepan. Over low heat, stirring constantly, heat until the custard mixture thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon (napé), approximately 7 to 10 minutes.  Carefully stir in the warm jam, cinnamon, and chile powder.  Take off heat and let cool ~1 hour.  

Cover and transfer to refrigerator for a few hours.  Transfer to ice cream maker and process according to manufacturer directions.  

Once your ice cream maker has stopped, sandwich a thick layer of ice cream between two cookies recipe follows, wrap in plastic wrap and freeze until firm.  Or simply eat it as is, or freeze for a firmer ice cream.

Chickpea and Apricot Thumbprint Cookies

yield: ~1 dozen lg. cookies

1 c. flour

1/2 c. chickpea flour*

1/4 c. sugar

pinch salt

pinch cinnamon

4 oz. cold butter, cut into chunks

2 eggs

Apricot Jam (see Main Course...prepared big batch)

Preheat oven to 350° F.  In a large bowl, mix together flours, sugar, salt and cinnamon.  Work the butter in quickly with your fingertips to form a crumbly dough.  Stir in eggs until mixture comes together.

Roll dough into balls the size of golfballs and set on a lined baking sheet.  Press down in the center of the cookie with your thumb.  Place ~1/2 tsp. Apricot Jam in the center of each.

Bake ~25-30 mins., until golden around edges.  Let cool on rack.  Eat as is or use for Ice Cream Sandwich cookies.

*to make Chickpea flour, I ground dried, unsoaked chickpeas in my food processor...adding just a few at a time...adding a few more as they started to turn to powder...until I had as much flour as I needed.  Strain through a sieve to remove any large bits that may not have broken down.

*If you'd like to see everybody else's entries...click HERE!


My other two courses...click on starter to see my 7 assigned ingredients plus my pantry/free items...

 *Starter

* Main Course

Fruit Fabulous Fruit.

I decided I wanted to go a little bit crazy with the fruit recently...I'll be talking about it over at My Food and Life Encounters (where I'm guest posting while Miranda is away) and I'll be talking about it right here, too! But with a different spin on things... But for now, let's talk about how to get a delicious bowl of this tasty summertime (oh....why not anytime) fruity, yogurty mixture!

Fruit & Yogurt Salad w/ honey & cinnamon... Choose your favorite fruits...or some new fruits you haven't tried...or just use the same ones I picked (it was a good combo)...go fruit wild! I went with 6 fruits all in various colors- because it's all about eating with eyes! I chose to "ball" my melons (you'll see why if you visit me on my "sister" post), but feel free to just cut them into chunks if you don't have a melon baller...or if you do have one, but don't feel like using it.

I thought I would begin by giving a little pineapple cutting tutorial. I've had many people tell me they were scared of cutting one without the aid of one of those corer/slicer doodads. Well, fear no more! Pineapples are seriously one of the easiest fruits to cut once you know how! Begin by securing your cutting board so that it doesn't slide when the inevitable slippery juices seep over the edges. First cut off the top and bottom of the pineapple. Set it upright and using a sharp chef's knife, begin slicing off that prickly skin just under the line of "eyes". Don't worry if you miss some, you can go back and shave them off later. Once that part is done...you're so golden! Admit it, that outside of the pineapple is definitely the scariest part. Next, cut through the pineapple from top to bottom, through the core. Then locate that core (it's lighter) on each section and simply slice it off. Now you have four big, gorgeous hunks of pineapple to slice, chunk, cut in anyway you choose! See...easy as pie right? Right! (If you want rings, simply cut the pineapple in half the short way once you've removed the top & bottom. Then pop out the core from each half with an apple corer. Then move on the next step of removing the skin. All that will remain will be slicing up those rings.)The next fruit I chose to use was cantaloupe. Begin by slicing off a thin slice from each end of the melon. This will serve as a flat edge to hold it steady. Now cut it in half (not through the flat end, through the other way) and scoop out the seeds with an ice cream scoop. With your melon baller, make your way around the flesh scooping out balls as close together as possible. Once you've gotten all the way around, using a very sharp knife, cut off a layer just as deep as your holes. Repeat the process until you've used up all the melon you are able to. You'll get a few extra balls from the very bottom curve, as well. No need to waste all that mangled looking melon...simply scoop it out and use it for smoothies...or some other fruity drink!Ditto on your honeydew...Your watermelon (use seedless for best results) uses the same process, but yields so much more because of the greater surface area. When it came to the strawberries, I just halved or quartered them depending on their size. The grapes I just plucked from their stems. Look at all this delicious fruit just waiting to mingle!Now...make yourself a little yogurt dressing for tossing it all up and bringing it together well.

Honey Cinnamon Yogurt Dressing (or dip)

by girlichef Yogurt-plain or vanilla Honey Cinnamon (or freshly grated Nutmeg...but then you'll have to change the name) Mix them all together to your taste! And YES...you can use this as a delicious fruit dip, too. But, what I did was tossed everything together for a big bowl of summertime satisfaction!My Fruit & Yogurt Salad w/ honey & cinnamon is also my submission for Souper (soup, salad & sammie) Sundays this week!

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Don't forget to head on over to check out my guest post today HERE...where I'll put a different spin on all of this awesome fruity goodness...see why I balled all of that melon!!!And made another addicting topper...we're talking a little bit of Spice! Don't miss it...