Cherry Soup

A friend of mine had a faux birthday party last week.  His real birthday was back in April, but it took us a few months to pull a little party together when everyone (particularly the birthday boy) had time.

I’ve taken to making desserts for everyone on their days, whatever those days might be, so I asked Kevin what his favorite dessert was.  After a long line of questioning we narrowed it down to Chocolate Cream Pie.  And as I have taken to doing lately, I turned to the Food Network website.  I narrowed it down to one by Emeril Lagasse.

The recipe, of course, is at the end.  But the first thing I had to do was chop up the chocolate.  There was four ounces of bittersweet and four ounces of unsweetened.  I think.  Maybe it was semi-sweet and unsweetened.  And you had to chop up this chocolate.  I thought it might be hard, but it wasn’t.  It was beautiful, really.  All those little sweet brown blocks flaking apart.

Then, ya crack some eggs open and separate the yolks and the whites.  Plop the yolks in a bowl with some sugar and beat it up right fine.   And then?  You melt the chocolate over a double boiler with some butter.

 

Beautiful, isn’t it?  I wanted to eat it all just like that.  But no.  No, I had to let it melt with the butter and then hang out for awhile while…

I warmed up some milk.  Once warm enough you pour about a cup of it in with the egg mixture to temper it and avoid the scrambled egg syndrome.  Then you pour all of the egg mixture into the pot of milk.  You get it going and then whisk in a lot of corn starch.

I had problems with the corn starch.  That’s why there are no pictures of that segment.  It clumped on me.  I think my sauce pan was too small, and I wasn’t able to whisk as well as I wanted to.  But it was okay.  Once the pie set and got cold, you couldn’t tell.

And I haven’t perfected meringue yet, either.  I’m getting there.  I’m alright with the trial and error.  It never turns out bad, just less than perfect.  But I really like the picture above.  I want to go to sleep in there.

And then there was pie.  Delicious, lovely, deeply chocolately pie.  Probably the most chocolately birthday pie ever.

You should know that I used a store-bought crust.   And I didn’t refrigerate the pie AT ALL until it was all done.  The filling went right into the pie shell and the meringue went right on top.  And THEN it went it to the fridge for a few hours.

Chocolate Cream Pie

Chocolate Filling:
4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into bits and softened
4 large egg yolks
1 cup sugar
3 1/2 cups milk
6 tablespoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla

Meringue Topping:
4 egg whites
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
Finely grated bittersweet chocolate, as garnish

Filling: In the top of a double-boiler, or in a metal bowl set over a pot of barely simmering water, melt the bittersweet and unsweetened chocolates and butter, stirring, until smooth. Remove from the heat.

In a bowl, beat the egg yolks with the sugar until thick and pale yellow.

In a medium, heavy saucepan, heat milk. Add 1 cup of the hot milk mixture to the yolks and whisk until smooth. Add the beaten yolk mixture to the saucepan with the hot milk and bring to a simmer over medium-low heat. Whisk in the cornstarch and salt and cook over very low heat until thickened. Simmer, whisking constantly, until thick and smooth, about 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and whisk in the melted chocolate and vanilla. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing down on the surface to prevent a skin from forming, and cool completely. Pour the filling into the crust and refrigerate until cold, at least 4 hours or overnight.

Meringue: In a large non-reactive bowl using an electric mixer, beat the egg whites with the cream of tartar and salt until soft peaks start to form. Slowly add the sugar while beating and continue to beat until glossy and stiff peaks form. (Be careful not to overbeat, as will be difficult to spread.)

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.

Spread the meringue over the chocolate pie, smoothing out to the pastry edges (so the meringue won’t draw up during baking). With a dull knife, make decorative peaks in the meringue. Bake until the meringue is golden, about 14 to 15 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let cool for at least 2 hours in the refrigerator. Sprinkle with grated chocolate, and serve.

This entry was posted Sunday, July 8th, 2007 at 11:53 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.