Home Grown Nutrition

My latest executive decision: Dark chocolate is the ingredient of the month.  Mighty powerful brainstorm you may be saying to yourself – who doesn’t like chocolate?  Well, actually, ahem – Me.  It’s not that I am a chocolate hater, I just don’t loooove chocolate the way other people do.  Celebrations are always all about chocolate cake, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate bars, etc.  On my 12th birthday, I actually asked for pecan pie.  Seriously deranged you say?  Perhaps just a little nutty, I say.

The facutly at the esteemed institution where I obtained my training in nutrition used to joke that a penchant for chocolate was a requirement for admission.  And its no wonder with all the great health benefits coming to light about dark chocolate.  It contains plant compounds called flavanols that help prevent fatty buildup in our arteries, and can even  lower blood pressure.  This little truth-teller had to work very hard to keep her dirty secret under wraps.

The catch is, it has to be dark chocolate.  Hershey kisses, snickers & mr. goodbar do not fall into this category.  Dark chocolate contains at least 60% cacao, or cocoa solids.  If you can get 70% or more, even better!  The more cacao, the less sweet the chocolate, because there is less room for added sugars, and added fats for that matter.

And, I am happy to report, I have finally found my chocolate weakness.  There is a wonderful local chocolate maker in the Fremont neighborhood, Theo Chocolates.  They buy Cacao directly from farms in places like Guatemala and Ecuador, everything is fair trade, and they make the chocolate themselves in their magical chocolate factory.  If you go on a tour of the factory they give you lots of samples.  Yum.  I like to use their dark chocolate bars in this flourless chocolate brownie cookie recipe.  Slightly crispy on the outside, gooey and rich on the inside. Yum yum yum.  This recipe is adapted from my favorite dessert cookbook: The Last Course by Claudia Flemming, to make it wheat and gluten free.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Flourless Chocolate Brownie Cookies

Makes about 3 dozen cookies, *Indicates ingredients grown or produced locally

*2 Large eggs

2/3 Cup Sugar

1 tsp Vanilla extract

1/4 tsp Almond extract

2 Tb Butter

*7 oz Dark/Bittersweet Chocolate (60-80% cacao), chopped

*1/4 Cup Cocoa powder

1/4 tsp Baking Powder

1/8 tsp salt (Sea salt or Kosher) - use the salt only if you are using unsalted butter

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Get out a large baking sheet and line it with parchment paper or a silpat.  In the bowl of an electric mixer, use whisk attachment to beat eggs, sugar, vanilla and almond extracts on high speed for 15 minutes.  This is key to getting the fluffy texture right.

While the eggs are whipping, heat the butter and chocolate in a heavy bottomed saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally with a rubber spatula until melted and smooth, then remove from the heat.

While the chocolate is melting, mix together the cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a small bowl with a fork.

Gently fold the melted chocolate into the egg mixture with the rubber spatula until mostly combined but with some streaks still visible.  Add the cocoa powder mixture and fold it in completely.  Drop the batter by heaping teaspoonfuls onto the baking sheet, about 1 inch apart.  Bake about 9 minutes, until the cookies have cracked puffy tops.  Lift the parchment with cookies onto a wire rack to cool.

*Options: You can also add 1/2 Cup chopped toasted nuts or dried fruit, folding in after the cocoa powder is added to the batter.  Baked cookies can be frozen for up to 1 month.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 18th, 2008 at 2:29 pm and is filed under Desserts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.