Chocolate fraîcheur

A recipe by Pierre Hermé, found in a book by la fondation Auguste Escoffier, collected by Paule Neyrat.

I almost threw away my first attempt at this recipe!

But I had resolved to never again abandon, ever since my first attempt at pâté, (which came out of the oven extremely liquid, and thinking it was ruined, it went straight to the wastebin. It turns out that this is more or less normal...)

In any case, this dessert came out fairly well. In retrospect, I should have put locks on the kitchen doors, where Becky's rabbit stands guard. Because when each one of the family comes in, one after the other, to help themselves and recount their life history, I just listen. The recipe suffers, as I empty the chocolate cream into the wrong mould... I corrected the error, and wreaked my wrath on all those in near vicinity. But they forgave me in the end...

Ingredients for 8 :

Biscuit "Brownie style":

125 gr of butter cut into small pieces

80 gr of dark chocolate

2 eggs

150 gr de castor sugar

60 gr of sieved flour

Optional 100 gr pecan nuts or walnuts

Chocolate cream :

250 ml milk

250 gr liquid single cream

6 eggs yolks

50 gr castor sugar

185 gr chopped fine dark chocolate

3 leaves of gelatin

Ganache :

100 gr of crème fraîche

100 gr chocolate

• Confection the biscuit : beat the butter at high speed in a mixer, and then add the chocolate, already melted in a bain-marie, in 3 steps, without stopping the mixer.
• Whip the sugar and eggs together, then add them to the mixer.
• Add in the flour and the nuts.
• Line a cake mould with greaseproof paper, add the biscuit mix and bake for 20 minutes in an oven at 170°c.
• After cooking, leave to cool entirely before removing the biscuit with the aid of a sharp knife around the edges.
• For the chocolate cream, prepare a crème anglaise : heat the milk and cream in a saucepan. Beat the sugar and eggs together, and once the milk is hot (but it must not boil), pour it over the sugar and eggs. Mix, and then pour back into the saucepan. Leave on a low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until the cream begins to thicken.
• Add the chocolate in 3 steps, beating vigorously to create a light emulsion, which should lead to a lighter cream.
• Add the melted gelatin to the hot cream.
• Clean the baking mould, replace the biscuit layer, and pour the hot chocolate cream over the top.
• Leave to cool for 6 to 8 hours in the fridgen or 2 hours in the freezer.
• The ganache : boil the cream in a saucepan. Add the chocolate, and stir with a whisk as it dissolves. As the mixture congeals, smoothen it with the whisk.
• Final presentation : Turn out the cake with the aid of a sharp knife, and spread the ganache over the top and sides, smoothing with a spatula.
• Leave to cool in the fridge.

Take a 2-hour nap to recover, and then serve.