Chocolate Hazelnuts About You & Cinnamon Pudding

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! We’ll be posting a new entry about one of our favorite breakfast spots in Berkeley soon (hint: it has a “happy hour” from 7am to 9am where you can get breakfast for $5!), but in the meantime, here’s a simple and delicious Valentine’s Day recipe. Treat yourself or someone else!

Chocolate Hazelnut & Cinnamon Pudding

Chocolate pudding has been around for centuries, but it first appeared in a cookbook published in Detroit in 1730. The Brits’ “pudding” was typically meat based and boiled in a bag. Christmas time brought out a sweeter version made from plums. The Ancient Romans made custard, and apparently liked to play with sweet and savory egg-based recipes, which is how custard came about. You can read more about the history on the Food Timeline here. For more food history, I’m also a big fan of the podcast Stuff You Should Know. They don’t have a pudding episode, but they do have a great one about the history of cake.

The recipe below is gluten free (as am I) and egg free, and is adapted from Gourmet. It is delicious, quick to make and you can pronounce all the ingredients- yay!

¼ Cup Cornstarch

⅓ Cup Sugar

3 Tablespoons unsweetened Cocoa Powder

¼ Teaspoon Salt

3 Cups Whole Milk

3 Ounces Bittersweet Chocolate

1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

1 Tablespoon Hazelnut Extract (or Almond if you prefer)

¼ Teaspoon Cinnamon

Optional: Add edible flowers/mint on top and/or serve with homemade whipped cream. Write a special message with icing if you'd like!

I enjoy the hazelnut and cinnamon because they bring a bit more complexity to the taste of the pudding. If hazelnut and cinnamon are not your thing, then you could also omit those, add mint extract and garnish with mint leaves. I like this recipe because it takes less than 30 minutes (not counting the chill time of at least 2 hours), and if you like to bake, most of these items are in your house anyways. For local shoppers, Berkeley Bowl has a great supply of extracts to play with.

To make the pudding: add all the ingredients together except for the chocolate, extracts and cinnamon. Bring to a boil and keep stirring with a whisk to avoid ingredients burning to the bottom. Stir for about 3 to 4 minutes once boiling so the pudding gets nice and thick. Add the final ingredients and dish it into ramekins or any ceramic container you’d like. Cover it in plastic to avoid a thick pudding skin from forming. Chill for 2 hours or more. Enjoy by yourself or with a fellow chocolate lover!

#easyrecipe #athome #homemade #dessert #glutenfree #eggfree #dessert #valentinesday