Wow. I'm in the chocolate block already. Tomorrow we make a chocolate box. Really. A box. Made of chocolate. One benefit of this class is I'm starting to OD on chocolate and I'm not as fond of it as I used to be. I can now eat just a tiny little piece, say "mmm. tasty." and walk away. Before, when confronted with, say, a chocolate pie, I'd have to eat until I got sick. Granted, a lot of that had to do with repressed emotional issues, but ... yeah. I lied. I can still eat an entire pie. Especially if someone makes it for me, I'm stressed out, and there's absolutely nothing else in the refrigerator except for suspect vegetables and a couple of dozen eggs. And chocolate. Did I say I was getting bored of chocolate?
Last night we turned in our candy bar creations. I made a "CARAT" chew. I was going to make it vegan and organic and gluten-free and all happy, but I never made it to the store. So I turned in a standard version and it was okay. Imagine a carrot cake as a chocolate bar. Yeah. Weird. I'm going to perfect the vegan version. I think it has potential. The surprising thing was the indian carrot paste. It came from one of Chef's old books. I modified it to make it tastier, but it's attached. The milk chocolate/anise ganache that went along with it was amazing. Absolutely amazing. I really want to get the book that it came from -- I think it was Jacques Torres, but I could be wrong. And I borrowed the Joy of Cooking shortbread recipe and added cardamom. I love cardamom. Enrobe it all in chocolate, and you've got my treat.
Indian Carrot Paste
4 T butter
2 tsp cardamom, anise each
8 oz carrot, grated
10 oz milk
5 oz sugar (doubled from original recipe)
a lot of almonds, blanched, peeled, halved
a lot of almonds, slivered
a lot of pistachios, chopped
a lot of seedless white raisins.
Melt butter, add cardamom. Stir over heat 2-3 min. Add carrots, cover, cook until soft, ≈ 15 min. Add milk, stir until all absorbed. Completely. It should be dry, dry, dry. Add sugar, slivered almonds, chopped pistachio and ½ raisins. Cook until shiny. I cooked until it was brown, and slightly caramelized, but took the temp only up to about 210. I was trying for caramelly and it didn't work. But it was still good. Spread evenly into buttered platter ½" thick. Decorate with halved almonds and rest of raisins. Let cool completely.
