Today is National Dark Chocolate Day.
Having survived one of the worst Januarys, due to weather, I decided to celebrate February and this fairly unknown foodie holiday with a vintage recipe of 40 years ago.
Full disclosure: I’m not a fan of dark chocolate.
The reason is due to an unfortunate experience I had in 1980 when my sister and I joined a group of college students from around the world on a tour of Europe. We visited Venice, Bavaria, and Paris, among other places during our two-week travels.
It was all great – except our visit to the French Riviera. The rocky beaches were unlike anything I had ever seen –or felt. We spread our towels on the jagged tips, trying to find a comfortable spot to no avail.
The worst part was discovering some people (old!) used the beach for displaying many body parts. In other words, it was a nudie beach.
It was almost more than my young, innocent mind could take in! Gasp!
The day was made worse by the fact that my sister and I had used up most of our traveler’s checks and didn’t have enough for a full meal (our trip paid for breakfast and evening meals only). Everything always comes down to food, doesn’t it?
Prior to arriving at the beach we found a café that sold dark chocolate so we bought a bar that we shared. A market stall sold apples, thus using the last of our traveler’s checks. Thankfully, we’d be boarding a plane to take us back to the US the next day.
But that piddly lunch on the rocky beach is strangely the only one I remember from our two-week visit. Not because of how uncomfortable we were due to the rocks –but due to the sight of all of the naked people parading around us and how sick I felt from watching them while eating dark chocolate on an empty stomach.
That was my last time to eat dark chocolate. Until now.
This recipe from a 1984 cookbook helped me expand my palate today to again include this popular treat. Coffee Tortoni in Chocolate Cups from A Taste of Indiana Holiday Sampler is easy and appealing. Although the recipe didn’t call for dark chocolate, I thought of a sweet (get it?) way of implementing it.
The cookbook was published by the American Cancer Society. I’ve cooked from it before. See Hot Spicy Curried Fruit.
My Notes at the end may help you to make this dessert. I’d encourage families to try it – kids of all ages will enjoy licking messy, chocolaty fingers!
I hope you enjoy National Dark Chocolate Day and this vintage recipe.
Tell a friend about this blog featuring goodies from the past. I find it comforting and fun to unearth culinary treasures from the past.
What is your favorite food memory?
Take care,
Kayleen
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Coffee Tortoni in Chocolate Cups
1 12-ounce package semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 egg white
1 T. instant coffee
2 T. sugar
1 c. whipped cream
¼ c. sugar
1 t. vanilla
1/8 t. almond extract
2 T. toasted flaked coconut
2 T. chopped toasted almonds
2 T. shaved dark chocolate
To make chocolate cups:
Melt chocolate chips over hot water, just to the point of being melted.
Place paper liners in 12 muffin tins.
With the back of a spoon coat the paper liners with melted chocolate.
Refrigerate to set the chocolate.
Carefully peel off the papers and return the chocolate cups to muffin tins.
For tortoni:
Whip egg white.
Gradually add coffee and 2 T. sugar.
Whip the cream with ¼ c. sugar and flavorings.
Fold egg white mix and half of the coconut and nuts into the whipped cream.
Pour into chocolate cups.
Freeze for at least 1 hour.
Garnish with remaining coconut, nuts and dark chocolate.
Yield: 12 servings
My Notes:
- Rather than use a double boiler to melt the chips on the stove, I put them in a microwave-safe bowl, cooking at 10 second intervals to soften, stirring after each interval. I made the intervals short because I tend to burn chocolate in the microwave. It took around 7 intervals for the chocolate to be just right and not burned.
- You can see from the photo how I crumbled my almonds – hammers can be handy in the kitchen as in any other room!
- Toasting the coconut and almonds was as simple as putting them separately into a dry saucepan and turning on the heat to medium, leaving them there for one minute, stirring slowly so they don’t burn. The oils from the almonds smelled good!
- Coat the paper liners well—I mean thick! When I tried to pull off the liners for the first couple after they had been refrigerated, the crinkly sides of the chocolate fell off. I re-heated my chocolate and coated them again.
- I didn’t have a 1/8 t. so I put in ¼ t. It was fine. I really liked the extra almond taste.
- The recipe says it yields 12 servings. I couldn’t make 12 servings filling the regular-sized paper liners to the brim. It only made 6. I think using mini- muffin pans and liners would be ideal for this recipe.
Vintage Eats of Kayleen Reusser 